# Formulas > Descriptive Statistics > Median

The median of a data set is the middle value when the data values are arranged in order of increasing magnitude.

The median is found by the following steps:

- Sort the values in increasing order.
- If the number of values is odd, the median is the number located in the exact middle of the list of sorted values.
- If the number of values is even, the median is the mean of the two middle values.