COUNT vs COUNTA: numbers only, or everything?

They look like twins but count different things: COUNT tallies only numbers, while COUNTA tallies every cell that isn't empty — text, dates, errors, TRUE/FALSE and all. Picking the wrong one is the classic reason a 'how many rows' total comes out too low or too high.

The differences at a glance

	COUNT	COUNTA
What it counts	Numbers only (incl. dates & times, which are numbers)	Any non-empty cell — text, numbers, errors, logicals
Text values	Ignored	Counted
Blank cells	Not counted	Not counted
Formula returning ""	Not counted	COUNTED — the cell isn't truly empty (the classic trap)
Error values (#N/A etc.)	Not counted	Counted
Compatibility	Universal	Universal — identical in every Excel, Sheets & LibreOffice version we test

Which should you use?

COUNT — You want 'how many numeric entries' — amounts filled in, measurements taken, scores recorded. Text labels and blanks are correctly skipped.
COUNTA — You want 'how many rows have anything' — names entered, tickets logged, any non-empty response. Watch out for cells holding a formula's "" result, which COUNTA still counts.

Compatibility (from executed tests)

Both execute identically across every version of all three apps we test. The one behavior that surprises people isn't a compat difference — it's that a cell containing =IF(...,"") is NOT empty, so COUNTA includes it and COUNTBLANK excludes it. To count only visually-blank cells, use COUNTBLANK; to count numbers, COUNT; to count real entries including text, COUNTA.

Example formulas

COUNT — numeric entries only	`=COUNT(A2:A100)`
COUNTA — any non-empty cell	`=COUNTA(A2:A100)`
Text/blank rows = COUNTA minus COUNT	`=COUNTA(A2:A100)-COUNT(A2:A100)`

Full per-version details on each function page: COUNT · COUNTA.