BITXOR functionThe BITXOR function is a bitwise XOR (exclusive or) of 2 numbers that returns a bit of “1” if 2 bits are different, and a bit of “0” otherwise. This function returns a number that’s the result of performing an XOR function at each bit of the 2 given numbers.
Parts of a BITXOR function
BITXOR(value1, value2)
Part
Description
Notes
value1
The first numeric value.
value2
The second numeric value.
Sample formulas
BITXOR(9, 5)
BITXOR(A1, A2)
Notes
Order doesn’t matter for values. The result is the same regardless.
Values don’t necessarily have to be numbers. Instead, they may be coerced. For example, a string value of “3” can be coerced to be simply 3, and a Boolean value of TRUE can be coerced to 1.
Examples
In the following example, we use BITXOR with values inlined into the function. The values 2 (represented as 10 in base 2) and 4 (represented as 100 in base 2) result in 6 (represented as 110 in base 2):
A
B
1
Formula
Result
2
=BITXOR(2, 4)
6
In this example, values of 2 and 4 result in a BITXOR of 6. However, this time we use cell references to use as our values:
A
B
C
1
Formula
Result
Reference cells
2
=BITXOR(2, 4)
6
2
3
4
Related functions
BITOR: The BITOR function returns the bitwise Boolean OR of 2 numbers.
XOR: The XOR function returns TRUE if an odd number of the provided arguments are logically true, and FALSE otherwise.