What is the Percentage Difference from 40 to 24?
From 40 to 24 is a 40% decrease
Step by step
- Difference: 24 − 40 = -16
- Divide by the starting value: -16 ÷ 40 = -0.4
- Multiply by 100: -40%
How the answer is worked out
Percentage change measures a difference against the value you started with. The value went from 40 to 24, a difference of 16. Compared with the starting value of 40, that difference is 40%, so this is a 40% decrease.
The new value is 60% of the old one: for every 100 at the start there are now 60, so 40 out of every 100 have gone.
Why calculate this?
Percentage change compares a new value with an old one regardless of size: price rises, growth, discounts, score changes.
- Sales: a price cut from $40 to $24 is a 40% discount.
- Weight: going from 40 to 24 kilograms is a loss of 40% of the starting weight.
- Results: if a team scores 24 points this season after 40 last season, its total has dropped by 40%.
A quicker way
Find 1% of the starting value: 40 ÷ 100 = 0.4. The difference of 16 is 40 of those steps.
Percentage change is not the same as percentage points. If a rate moves from 40% to 24%, it changes by 16 percentage points, but by 40% relative to where it started.
Check the answer
Work forwards from the start: 40 × (1 − 0.4) = 40 × 0.6 = 24. Getting 24 shows the answer is right.
Rounding
Rounded to a whole number the change is -40, to one decimal place -40.0 and to two decimal places -40.00. Round only at the end: rounding halfway through a calculation can change the last digit.
The formula explained
percentage change = (new value − old value) ÷ old value × 100. A positive result is an increase and a negative result is a decrease. The old value is always the base, which is why the change from A to B and from B to A are different percentages.
Another worked example: 8 to 90
- Difference: 90 − 8 = 82
- Divide by the starting value: 82 ÷ 8 = 10.25
- Multiply by 100: 1,025%
Why the change back is different
A 40% fall followed by a 40% rise does not bring you back to 40: it gives 33.6. The second percentage is taken of 24, not of 40, so to undo this change you need 66.6667% instead.
Other ways to ask this
The same calculation is often asked in other words. All of these have the answer above:
- Percentage decrease from 40 to 24
- What percent less is 24 than 40?
- 40 to 24 as a percent change
- How much did 40 fall going to 24, in percent?
- Relative change between 40 and 24
Terms used on this page
- Old value: the starting amount, used as the base of the percentage.
- New value: the amount after the change.
- Increase: a positive change: the new value is bigger.
- Percentage point: the plain difference between two rates, not a relative change.
The answer in other forms
| Change | -40% |
|---|---|
| Difference | -16 |
| New ÷ old | 0.6 |
| Direction | decrease |
Related results
| 40 to 22 | From 40 to 22 is a 45% decrease |
| 40 to 23 | From 40 to 23 is a 42.5% decrease |
| 40 to 25 | From 40 to 25 is a 37.5% decrease |
| 40 to 26 | From 40 to 26 is a 35% decrease |
| 40 to 34 | From 40 to 34 is a 15% decrease |
The other way round: Percentage difference from 24 to 40
Doing it in a spreadsheet
In Excel, Google Sheets or Numbers type =(24-40)/40*100 into any cell. Replace the numbers with cell references (for example A1 and B1) to reuse the formula for a whole column.
Common mistakes
Always divide by the starting value, not the new one. A rise from 40 to 50 is +25%, but the fall from 50 back to 40 is −20%.
Practice examples
| 8 to 90 | Show answerFrom 8 to 90 is a 1,025% increase |
| 34 to 57 | Show answerFrom 34 to 57 is a 67.6471% increase |
| 21 to 55 | Show answerFrom 21 to 55 is a 161.9048% increase |
| 13 to 93 | Show answerFrom 13 to 93 is a 615.3846% increase |
| 79 to 53 | Show answerFrom 79 to 53 is a 32.9114% decrease |
| 89 to 66 | Show answerFrom 89 to 66 is a 25.8427% decrease |
| 30 to 90 | Show answerFrom 30 to 90 is a 200% increase |
| 92 to 10 | Show answerFrom 92 to 10 is a 89.1304% decrease |
| 17 to 20 | Show answerFrom 17 to 20 is a 17.6471% increase |
| 2 to 49 | Show answerFrom 2 to 49 is a 2,350% increase |
How this answer was calculated
The result is worked out from the numbers in this page's address when the page is opened, using exact arithmetic wherever possible and rounding only for display. Nothing is copied from a printed table. If you think an answer is wrong, please tell us through the contact page and we will check it.
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Questions
What is the Percentage Difference from 40 to 24?
Going from 40 to 24 is a 40% decrease. Formula and steps.
Is going from 40 to 24 an increase or a decrease?
A decrease: the value fell by 16, which is 40% of the starting value.
What is the percentage change from 24 back to 40?
66.6667%. It is a different number because the starting value is now 24, not 40.
What is the percentage difference between 40 and 24?
When neither value is the starting point, use the average as the base: 16 ÷ 32 × 100 = 50%. That is the symmetric percentage difference.
How do I calculate percentage change in Excel or Google Sheets?
Put the old value in A1 and the new value in B1, then type =(B1-A1)/A1 and format the cell as a percentage. For these numbers it shows -40%.