Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. If you are using a later version (Word 2007 or later), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for later versions of Word, click here: Conditional Calculations in Word.

Conditional Calculations in Word

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated October 30, 2021)
This tip applies to Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003


One big benefit of using a spreadsheet program like Excel is the ability to create formulas that define results based on other information within the spreadsheet. Word is not Excel, but it does allow you to perform simple arithmetic based on the contents of a table. This can come in very handy in many instances.

What if you want to perform a conditional calculation, however? For instance, let's assume you have the following calculation field in a table cell:

{ = (B2-B1) }

What if you want to display the result only if B2 is not equal to zero? If B2 is zero, then you want the result displayed by the calculation to be zero.

To create conditional calculations, you use the IF field. This field causes Word to do a comparison, and then choose different results based on the outcome of the comparison. In this case, you want to test if B2 is equal to zero. If it is, then you want to return a value of zero. If it is not, then you want to do the subtraction. This is how such a compound field calculation would appear:

{ =IF (B2=0,0,B2-B1) }

The key factor in this IF formula is the comparison it performs. The comparison is the first element within the parentheses, in this case B2=0. The result of this comparison determines which of the following elements are used in the field. If the comparison is TRUE, then the first element (0) is used. If the comparison if FALSE, then the second element (B2-B1) is used. You can easily change the comparison to some other operation, if desired. For instance, if you want to make sure that zero was returned anytime that B2 was 0 or less, then you could use the formula B2<=0.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (1671) applies to Microsoft Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. You can find a version of this tip for the ribbon interface of Word (Word 2007 and later) here: Conditional Calculations in Word.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Inserting the Total Number of Pages in Your Document

Word keeps track of many statistics for each of your documents. One statistic is the total number of pages in the printed ...

Discover More

Printing Only Selected Rows from a Table

Tables are a great way to organize the information in a document. If your table gets quite long, you may not want to ...

Discover More

Stopping Fractions from Reducing

Enter a fraction into Excel, and you may be surprised that the program reduces the faction to its simplest form. If you ...

Discover More

Create Custom Apps with VBA! Discover how to extend the capabilities of Office 365 applications with VBA programming. Written in clear terms and understandable language, the book includes systematic tutorials and contains both intermediate and advanced content for experienced VB developers. Designed to be comprehensive, the book addresses not just one Office application, but the entire Office suite. Check out Mastering VBA for Microsoft Office 365 today!

More WordTips (menu)

Inserting a Document's Path

You can use the FILENAME field to insert a document's filename and, optionally, the path to that filename. However, if ...

Discover More

Deleting All Fields

Fields can be a great way of adding small snippets of dynamic data to your documents. However, you may want to get rid of ...

Discover More

Finding Fields

Fields allow you to add simple dynamic content to your document. Here's how you can find the fields when you need to know ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is nine minus 1?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)


This Site

Got a version of Word that uses the menu interface (Word 97, Word 2000, Word 2002, or Word 2003)? This site is for you! If you use a later version of Word, visit our WordTips site focusing on the ribbon interface.

Videos
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.