BITOR function: Description, Usage, Syntax, Examples and Explanation

What is BITOR function in Excel?

BITOR function is one of Engineering functions in Microsoft Excel that returns a bitwise ‘OR’ of two numbers.

BITOR(number1, number2)

The BITOR function syntax has the following arguments.

The result is a bitwise ‘OR’ of its parameters.
In the result, each bit position is 1 if any of the parameter’s bits at that position are 1.
The values returned from the bit positions progress from right to left as powers of 2. The rightmost bit returns 1 (2^0), the bit to the left returns 2 (2^1), and so on.
If either argument is outside their constraints, BITOR returns the #NUM! error value.
If either argument is greater than (2^48)-1, BITOR returns the #NUM! error value.
If either argument is a non-numeric value, BITOR returns the #VALUE! error value.

Steps to follow:

1. Open a new Excel worksheet.

2. Copy data in the following table below and paste it in cell A1

Note: For formulas to show results, select them, press F2 key on your keyboard and then press Enter.

You can adjust the column widths to see all the data, if need be.

Formula	Description	Result	How it works
=BITOR(23,10)	Compares the bit positions for the binary representations of the two numbers, and if either position contains 1, returns 2 raised to a power, depending on bit position. Then, those numbers are summed.	31	The number 23 is 10111 in binary, and 10 is 1010. The value 1 is found in either position at all 5 positions of either of the two numbers. You can express 1010 as 01010 so that both numbers have the same number of digits. The numbers 2^0, 2^1, 2^2, 2^3, and 2^4 are summed, for a total of 31.
			23 = 10111
			10 = 01010
			Test: Is 1 found at any of the 5 positions?
			yyyyy
			1+2+4+8+16=31