How to set up COUNTIF or COUNTIFS formula in Google Sheets to compare columns? - if-statement

Question

I am trying to compare the numerical data in two columns in Google Sheets (say, Col. A and B) and return a count of all of the times that they vary by say, more than 1 (e.g., if A3 = 5 and B3 = 2, this should get counted). The two-column arrays will always be of equal size.
At first, I thought that either COUNTIF or COUNTIFS would be my go-to tool, but I can't get this to work with either formula. These formulas seem to handle criteria within a cell, but - as far as I can tell - can't handle criteria comparing data within two different (adjacent) cells.
Can someone help me with some super syntax work-around to get COUNTIF/COUNTIFS to work... or is there a more appropriate formula to the job (perhaps involving FILTER)?
*Quick Edit: I know I could always add an additional column, which would be very simple in this example. But my real-world spreadsheets are a lot more complex and are already suffering from column overload. A lot of other formulas are already set up around existing columns, and I was hoping to discover a more elegant solution that would allow me to come up with the count without having to add a new column for each and every comparison calculation.

Answer 1

=ARRAYFORMULA(IF(LEN(A:A&B:B), IF(A:A-B:B>1, 1, )+IF(B:B-A:A>1, 1, ), ))
if you want final sum instead of "per row" count use:
=SUM(ARRAYFORMULA(IF(LEN(A:A&B:B), IF(A:A-B:B>1, 1, )+IF(B:B-A:A>1, 1, ), )))

Answer 2

Add a third column, containing e.g. =ABS(SUM(A3-B3)). (The ABS gives you the positive difference regardless of which value is larger.)
At the bottom of that column, use COUNTIF like =COUNTIF(C1:C25, ">1") (where C1:C25 is the range of cels containing those positive differences).