Median Calculator
Enter a list of numbers separated by commas or spaces and instantly find the median, Q1 (first quartile), Q3 (third quartile), IQR (interquartile range), and the sorted data set.
When to Use Median Instead of Mean
- Skewed data — income, home prices, and other right-skewed distributions
- Outliers present — a single extreme value can distort the mean but not the median
- Ordinal data — survey responses on a Likert scale (1–5)
- Open-ended intervals — when the highest or lowest category is unbounded
Related Statistics Calculators
- Mean / Average Calculator — arithmetic, geometric, and harmonic mean
- Mode Calculator — find the most frequent value
- Five Number Summary Calculator — Min, Q1, Median, Q3, Max with box plot
- Range Calculator
- All Statistics Calculators
Frequently Asked Questions
How to find median?
Sort the numbers from smallest to largest. If the count is odd, the median is the middle number. If the count is even, the median is the average of the two middle numbers. Example: for 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 the median is 6.
What if there's an even number of values?
When you have an even number of values, take the two middle numbers and average them. For example, for 1, 3, 5, 7 the two middle values are 3 and 5, so the median is (3 + 5) ÷ 2 = 4.
What is IQR?
IQR (Interquartile Range) = Q3 − Q1. It measures the spread of the middle 50% of your data. It is resistant to outliers and is the basis for box plot whiskers and outlier detection (values below Q1 − 1.5×IQR or above Q3 + 1.5×IQR).
Median vs mean?
The median is the middle value; the mean is the arithmetic average. Use the median for skewed data or data with outliers. Use the mean for symmetric, normally-distributed data. For example, incomes of 30k, 40k, 50k, 60k, 1M have mean = 236k but median = 50k.
The median is a robust measure of central tendency that is not affected by extreme values or outliers.
