Formula to count total number of items selected in a column of multi-select fields

Brandon Wiley

Hi, I have a column called Type, which I've set up as a multi-select drop down. I'm struggling with a formula to count all the items that have been selected. For example, they may have selected 4 responses on each row, but when I created the summary field to do the count on the column, it only gives me the number of rows (10), not the total of all the selected items on those 10 rows (40, assuming 4 selected items on each row in the column) I had done this: =COUNT([Topic-Type]:[Topic-Type]) which gave me the 10, but didn't count all the responses. Here is an example of the data in the column. I'd like to count ALL the Topics selected across all the rows in the column, and it's only counting rows. Make sense? Thanks!

David Tutwiler

I think you just need to switch your function from COUNT to COUNTM and it will work as intended.

Brandon Wiley

Thanks David, that fixed it!

David Tutwiler

I think you just need to switch your function from COUNT to COUNTM and it will work as intended.

Brandon Wiley

Thanks David, that fixed it!

Noble B

i'm looking for something similar however, i'm "referring another shee"t for my multi select column. I tried =COUNTM({Type}) and it came back as impermissible.