Both function combinations will skip over any blank row and will not count towards the running total of unique values, as there is no value to be counted.

When counting unique values in Microsoft Excel, use UNIQUE() as a helper function and avoid more complicated expressions.

Keep the differences in the same column and you can drag this formula down the Excel spreadsheet, and it will automatically find the hours worked in each row.

How to obtain a Distinct Count in Excel using a basic PivotTable.

Counting records or values in Microsoft Excel is easy. Counting individual cells by their fill color definitely isn't. Using an old function and a matrix tames the problem.