SKEW

See Also

Returns the skewness of a distribution. Skewness characterizes the degree of asymmetry of a distribution around its mean. Positive skewness indicates a distribution with an asymmetric tail extending toward more positive values. Negative skewness indicates a distribution with an asymmetric tail extending toward more negative values.

Syntax

SKEW(number1,number2,...)

Number1, number2 ... are 1 to 30 arguments for which you want to calculate skewness. You can also use a single array or a reference to an array instead of arguments separated by commas.

Remarks

The arguments must be either numbers or names, arrays, or references that contain numbers.
If an array or reference argument contains text, logical values, or empty cells, those values are ignored; however, cells with the value zero are included.
If there are fewer than three data points, or the sample standard deviation is zero, SKEW returns the #DIV/0! error value.
The equation for skewness is defined as:

Example

The example may be easier to understand if you copy it to a blank worksheet.

Show How?

Create a blank workbook or worksheet.
Select the example in the Help topic. Do not select the row or column headers.

Selecting an example from Help
Press CTRL+C.
In the worksheet, select cell A1, and press CTRL+V.
To switch between viewing the results and viewing the formulas that return the results, press CTRL+` (grave accent), or on the Tools menu, point to Formula Auditing, and then click Formula Auditing Mode.

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Formula	Description (Result)
=SKEW(A2:A11)	Skewness of a distribution of the data set above (0.359543)