Skip to content
Free Excel Tutorials
  • Home
  • Excel For Beginners
  • Excel Intermediate
  • Advanced Excel For Experts

Data Analysis

  • How to calculate correlation coefficient Correlation in Excel
  • Conditional Formatting Icon Sets Examples in Excel
  • How To Create Frequency Distribution in Excel
  • How to add Trendline to a chart in Excel
  • Subtotal function in Excel

References

  • How to use Excel VLOOKUP Function
  • LOOKUP function: Description, Usage, Syntax, Examples and Explanation
  • Convert text string to valid reference in Excel using Indirect function
  • How to get relative row numbers in a range in Excel
  • Basic INDEX MATCH approximate in Excel

Data Validations

  • Excel Data validation must not contain
  • Excel Data validation unique values only
  • Excel Data validation must contain specific text
  • Excel Data validation require unique number
  • Excel Data validation specific characters only

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

by

What is BITXOR function in Excel?

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

Syntax of BITXOR function

BITXOR(number1, number2)

The BITXOR function syntax has the following arguments.

  • Number1: Must be greater than or equal to 0.
  • Number2: Must be greater than or equal to 0.

BITXOR formula explanation

  • BITXOR returns a decimal number that is the result of the sum of a bitwise ‘XOR’ (exclusive XOR) of its parameters.
  • If either argument is outside its constraint, BITXOR returns the #NUM! error value.
  • If either argument is greater than (2^48)-1, BITXOR returns the #NUM! error value.
  • If either argument is a non-numeric value, BITXOR returns the #VALUE! error value.
  • In the result, each bit position is 1 if the values of the parameters at that bit position are not equal; in other words, one value is 0 and the other is 1. For example, using BITXOR(5,3), 5 is expressed as 101 in binary and 3 as 11 in binary. To help with comparison, you can consider 3 as 011. From right to left, the bit values at the three positions in this example are the same (1) only at the rightmost position. A ‘not equal’ result returns a 1 for the second and third positions from the right, and an ‘equal’ result returns 0 for the rightmost position.
  • Values of 1 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.
  • Using the same example, 0 is returned for the rightmost bit position because it is a 0, 2 (2^1) is returned for the second bit position from the right (a 1 value), and 4 (2^2) is returned for the leftmost bit (also a 1 value). The total is 6, in decimal representation.

Example of BITXOR function

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
=BITXOR(5,3) Returns the total of the bitwise “Exclusive Or” comparision at each bit position. 6 The number 5 is 101 in binary, and 3 is 11. You can express 11 as 011 so that both numbers have 3 digits. A bitwise ‘Exclusive Or’ comparison checks to see if both digits at each position are not equal and, if true, returns a positive value for that position.
Test: At which positions are the digits not equal?
5 in binary = 101
3 in binary = 011
yyn
(1*(2^2))+(1*(2^1))+(1*0)
4+2+0
6

Post navigation

Previous Post:

How to generate random date between two dates in Excel

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Learn Basic Excel

Ribbon
Workbook
Worksheets
Format Cells
Find & Select
Sort & Filter
Templates
Print
Share
Protect
Keyboard Shortcuts

Categories

  • Charts
  • Data Analysis
  • Data Validation
  • Excel Functions
    • Cube Functions
    • Database Functions
    • Date and Time Functions
    • Engineering Functions
    • Financial Functions
    • Information Functions
    • Logical Functions
    • Lookup and Reference Functions
    • Math and Trig Functions
    • Statistical Functions
    • Text Functions
    • Web Functions
  • Excel VBA
  • Excel Video Tutorials
  • Formatting
  • Grouping
  • Others

Logical Functions

  • SWITCH function example in Excel
  • IF with boolean logic in Excel
  • Check multiple cells are equal in Excel
  • XOR function: Description, Usage, Syntax, Examples and Explanation
  • How to use Excel AND Function

Date Time

  • Add business days to date in Excel
  • Get work hours between dates custom schedule in Excel
  • List holidays between two dates in Excel
  • Convert decimal seconds to Excel time
  • Get day name from date in Excel

Grouping

  • Group numbers at uneven intervals in Excel
  • Group times into unequal buckets in Excel
  • How to randomly assign data to groups in Excel
  • Calculate conditional mode with criteria in Excel
  • Group times into 3 hour buckets in Excel

General

  • How to calculate decrease by percentage in Excel
  • How to generate random times at specific intervals in Excel
  • Excel Operators
  • Sum by group in Excel
  • Find, Select, Replace and Go To Special in Excel
© 2025 xlsoffice . All Right Reserved. | Teal Smiles | Abbreviations And Their Meaning