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PowerShell Measure and Count

Measure-Object is a cmdlet that summarizes numbers flowing through the pipeline. It can count them, add them up, or find their average, largest, and smallest values.

Add numbers up

Pipe a range into Measure-Object -Sum. Then print only the .Sum property.

(1..5 | Measure-Object -Sum).Sum

Count the items that pass a filter

Filter the range first, then measure it. The .Count property tells how many items survived.

(1..10 | Where-Object { $_ -gt 7 } | Measure-Object).Count

Find the average and the extremes

One Measure-Object call can compute several summaries at once. Print each property on its own line.

$result = 1..4 | Measure-Object -Average -Maximum -Minimum
$result.Average
$result.Maximum
$result.Minimum

Example

$result = 1..20 | Where-Object { $_ % 2 -eq 0 } | Measure-Object -Sum -Average
$result.Sum
$result.Average

Key points

  • Summary: Measure-Object turns a stream of numbers into one summary.
  • Sum: The .Sum property holds the total of the numbers.
  • Count: The .Count property holds how many numbers there were.
  • Average: The .Average property holds the mean of the numbers.
  • Extremes: The .Maximum property holds the largest number, and .Minimum holds the smallest.

In this example, the even numbers from 1 to 20 are filtered out first. Measure-Object then adds them up and averages them, and the example prints the .Sum and .Average properties.

Note

Never print the Measure-Object result itself. Print one of its properties, like .Sum or .Count.

Try it Yourself

Edit the code, then press Run.

Running is simulated

Exercise

What does (1..4 | Measure-Object -Sum).Sum print?