How to count a character in an Excel cell or a range?

To count the number of a specific character in a single cell of a list may be easy when there only several cells. However, if there are dozens of cells in a list, how can you quickly count a specific character in each cell of the list in Excel?

Count a specific character in a cell string or range with formulas

Count a specific character in a cell string or range with Kutools for Excel

Count a specific character in a cell string or range with formulas

In Excel, you can use some formulas to solve this task.

Select a cell which you will output the result into, for instance, C2, enter this formula =LEN(A2)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A2,B2,"")), and press Enter key to count, and then drag AutoFill handle over the cells needed the formula. See screenshots:

Note: in this formula, A2 is the cell you want to count the specified character from, and B2 is the character you want to count.

Tip: If you want to count the total number of a specific character in a range, you can use this formula =SUMPRODUCT(LEN(A2:A6)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A2:A6,B2,""))), and A2:A2 is the range you want to count the specified character from, and B2 is the character you want to count.

Count a specific character in a cell string or range with Kutools for Excel

If you are not familiar with formulas, you can use Kutools for Excel’s Count times a word appears function to quickly and easily count a specific character in a single cell or range.

Kutools for Excel, with more than 300 handy functions, makes your jobs more easier.
Free Download free full-featured in 30 days

After free installing Kutools for Excel, please do as below:

1. Select a cell which you will output the result into, and click Kutools > Formula Helper > Formula Helper. See screenshot:

2. In the Formula Helper dialog, choose Count the number of a word from Choose a formula section, then click next to Text to select the range you want to count from, and then click next to Word to select the character you want to count. See screenshot:

Tip: You also can type the character inclosed with “” directly into the Word textbox, such as this “n”.

3. Click Ok, and the character is counted. Then you can drag the auto fill handle of the cell over the cells you need.

Tip: If you want to count a specific character in each cell, you just need to select the first cell in the Text box in the Formula Helper dialog, then drag the fill handle over cells to fill the formula to get number of character in each cell.

Relative Articles:

The Best Office Productivity Tools

Kutools for Excel Solves Most of Your Problems, and Increases Your Productivity by 80%

Reuse: Quickly insert complex formulas, charts and anything that you have used before; Encrypt Cells with password; Create Mailing List and send emails...
Super Formula Bar (easily edit multiple lines of text and formula); Reading Layout (easily read and edit large numbers of cells); Paste to Filtered Range...
Merge Cells/Rows/Columns without losing Data; Split Cells Content; Combine Duplicate Rows/Columns... Prevent Duplicate Cells; Compare Ranges...
Select Duplicate or Unique Rows; Select Blank Rows (all cells are empty); Super Find and Fuzzy Find in Many Workbooks; Random Select...
Exact Copy Multiple Cells without changing formula reference; Auto Create References to Multiple Sheets; Insert Bullets, Check Boxes and more...
Extract Text, Add Text, Remove by Position, Remove Space; Create and Print Paging Subtotals; Convert Between Cells Content and Comments...
Super Filter (save and apply filter schemes to other sheets); Advanced Sort by month/week/day, frequency and more; Special Filter by bold, italic...
Combine Workbooks and WorkSheets; Merge Tables based on key columns; Split Data into Multiple Sheets; Batch Convert xls, xlsx and PDF...
More than 300 powerful features. Supports Office/Excel 2007-2019 and 365. Supports all languages. Easy deploying in your enterprise or organization. Full features 30-day free trial. 60-day money back guarantee.

Read More... Free Download... Purchase...

Office Tab Brings Tabbed interface to Office, and Make Your Work Much Easier

Enable tabbed editing and reading in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, Access, Visio and Project.
Open and create multiple documents in new tabs of the same window, rather than in new windows.
Increases your productivity by 50%, and reduces hundreds of mouse clicks for you every day!