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The process for finding the lowest three values in Excel involves using the MIN function and sorting the data in ascending order. To do so, select the cells containing the data you want to find the lowest three values for, then click on the “Data” tab and select “Sort.” In the “Sort” dialog box, choose the column you want to sort by and select “Smallest to Largest” under the “Order” drop-down menu. Next, use the MIN function to find the lowest value in the sorted data. Repeat this process two more times, each time selecting the next lowest value.
For example, if you have a column of numbers ranging from 1 to 10 and you want to find the lowest three values, you would select the cells containing the numbers, click on the “Data” tab, and select “Sort.” In the “Sort” dialog box, choose the column with the numbers and select “Smallest to Largest” under the “Order” drop-down menu. Then, in a separate cell, use the MIN function to find the lowest value in the sorted data. Repeat this process two more times, each time selecting the next lowest value. This will give you the three lowest values in the data set.
Find Lowest 3 Values in Excel (With Example)
You can use the following formula in Excel to find the lowest 3 values in a particular range:
=TRANSPOSE(SMALL(B2:B13, {1,2,3}))
This particular formula will return an array with the lowest 3 values from the range B2:B13.
The following example shows how to use this formula in practice.
Example: Find Lowest 3 Values in Excel
Suppose we have the following dataset in Excel that shows the points scored by various basketball players:
Now suppose that we would like to find the lowest 3 values in the Points column.
We can type the following formula into cell D2 to do so:
=TRANSPOSE(SMALL(B2:B13, {1,2,3}))
The following screenshot shows how to use this formula:
From the output we can see that the lowest 3 points values are 11, 12 and 15.
We can manually verify that these three values are indeed the lowest in the Points column:
Also note that we could return these three values horizontally by dropping the TRANSPOSE function from the formula:
=SMALL(B2:B13, {1,2,3})
The formula now returns the lowest 3 values from the Points column horizontally instead of vertically.
Additional Resources
The following tutorials explain how to perform other common tasks in Excel: