Change in return of AVERAGE function - Mac Excel

I was puzzled that a spreadsheet I use daily generated an error today that had not existed in earlier versions. Attempts to confirm the validity of the spreadsheet functions by running prior version...

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NikolinoDE
Jan 17, 2026
Only numeric values count
Empty or text-only ranges now correctly trigger #DIV/0!
That’s why:
Zeros → AVERAGE = 0
Empty → AVERAGE = #DIV/0!
This aligns Mac Excel with Windows Excel and Excel Online.
So when you open:
an old file
or even an older copy of Excel
the new calculation logic is applied, producing the same error everywhere.
general fix
=IFERROR(AVERAGE(A1:A10), 0)
This preserves your prior behavior explicitly.
If blanks should count as zero
=AVERAGE(IF(A1:A10="",0,A1:A10))
(Confirm with Cmd+Shift+Enter if not using dynamic arrays.)

Other functions affected similarly
This stricter behavior also applies to:
AVERAGEIF / AVERAGEIFS
STDEV, VAR
MIN, MAX (when all values are non-numeric)
Any function that divides by COUNT()
So it’s worth auditing any formulas that assumed empty = zero.
Bottom line
Your understanding is correct
This was a calculation-engine change, not your mistake
Your workaround is the correct long-term approach

My answers are voluntary and without guarantee!

Hope this will help you.

Was the answer useful? Mark as best response and like it!
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Stuart_Miller

Copper Contributor

Jan 22, 2026

Many thanks. Your answer is what I suspected.

I had not counted on the other affected formulas, such as MAX, MIN or COUNT() issues. I have many formulas relying on blank = 0 and have not yet seen issues with blanks but may be missing them.

I have a lot of work to do to fix this. I wish there was a tool to hunt these down in a huge spreadsheet..

NikolinoDE

Platinum Contributor

Jan 22, 2026

For very big workbooks, you can run a macro to highlight formulas referencing ranges that may include blanks:

Sub HighlightFormulasWithRanges()
    Dim ws As Worksheet, cell As Range
    For Each ws In ActiveWorkbook.Worksheets
        For Each cell In ws.UsedRange
            If cell.HasFormula Then
                If InStr(1, cell.Formula, "AVERAGE", vbTextCompare) > 0 _
                Or InStr(1, cell.Formula, "MAX", vbTextCompare) > 0 _
                Or InStr(1, cell.Formula, "MIN", vbTextCompare) > 0 _
                Or InStr(1, cell.Formula, "STDEV", vbTextCompare) > 0 _
                Or InStr(1, cell.Formula, "VAR", vbTextCompare) > 0 Then
                    cell.Interior.Color = RGB(255, 255, 0) 'Highlight in yellow
                End If
            End If
        Next cell
    Next ws
End Sub

This highlights all formulas with functions that are sensitive to blank cells.

You can then manually check / wrap them with IFERROR or IF(…="",0,…) as needed.

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Change in return of AVERAGE function - Mac Excel