STDEV

Units & Measurements abbreviation · Statistics

STDEV
Stands forStandard deviation (spreadsheet function)
CategoriesUnits & Measurements

STDEV stands for Standard deviation (spreadsheet function), a statistics abbreviation.

The Excel and Google Sheets function that returns the sample standard deviation of a range, dividing by n − 1. Newer Excel versions also offer STDEV.S for samples and STDEV.P for whole populations.

Example: =STDEV(B2:B51) returns the sample standard deviation of the 50 scores.

Usage notes

Excel 2010 introduced STDEV.S and STDEV.P to make the sample-versus-population choice explicit, keeping STDEV for compatibility. Using STDEV.P on a sample slightly understates variability. Python's statistics.stdev gives the sample result, while NumPy's np.std defaults to the population formula unless ddof=1 is set.

More statistics abbreviations

  • a.s. – Almost surely
  • ACF – Autocorrelation function
  • AIC – Akaike information criterion
  • ANCOVA – Analysis of covariance
  • ANOVA – Analysis of variance
  • ARIMA – Autoregressive integrated moving average
  • ATE – Average treatment effect
  • avg – Average
  • BIC – Bayesian information criterion
  • BLUE – Best linear unbiased estimator
  • CDF – Cumulative distribution function
  • CFA – Confirmatory factor analysis

See all 88 statistics abbreviations →