The table that follows describes the five basic operators and provides examples of simple formulas that show how they're used.

Operator	Description	Example	Result
+	addition	=2+2	4
–	subtraction	=4–2	2
*	multiplication	=4*2	8
/	division	=12/4	3
^	exponentiation	=4^2	16

Although the formulas in the preceding table can be useful ones to calculate, the neat part of Excel's formulas is that you don't have to include the actual values in the formula. In fact, you usually don't. You can typically reference the cells that hold the values. For example, let's say you want to calculate the monthly interest on a $100,000 loan that will charge 7 percent interest annually. To make this calculation, you could construct a formula that looks like what follows:

=100000*7.5%/12

An easier method (because it lets you quickly change formula input values later) is to construct a simple worksheet that stores the loan values and then references these values in the actual formula. For example, if cell B1 holds the value 100000 and cell B2 holds the value 7.5%, the following formula also calculates the monthly interest on a $100,000 loan that charges 7 percent annually:

=B1*B2/12