That being said, the spartan interface is clean and pleasing to the eye. There aren’t quite as many chart types available as Excel, and the charts can’t be edited outside Sheets like they can be in Microsoft Word, making visualizations less flexible. The Filter view is also easy to use, and the ability to share custom Filter views is quite practical. Formula tooltips provide definitions and arguments, for example, which is a step up from Excel.

It’s clear that the Google team has put a great deal of thought into ease of use. It may not have as many advanced features as Excel, such as what-if scenarios, but for most businesses that want to organize data and perform basic operations, Sheets will get the job done. Google Sheets is quite powerful when it comes to crunching numbers. With no software to download and everything stored in the cloud, the collaborative experience is remarkably smooth. While recent updates to Excel have improved collaboration tools, Google Sheets is still a leader in that regard, with chat, comments, real-time co-editing, and simple sharing. Prices start at around $6 / £5 / AU$9 per user per month when billed annually with the Business Basics plan. That being said, there are a load of online resources to help as well as a range of Excel online courses (opens in new tab). While there’s no generalized chat feature as with Google Docs, threaded comments make it easy to discuss data.Īll this functionality comes at a price: the sheer volume of features makes this software a bit daunting for first-time users, so expect something of a learning curve. Changes update automatically across all devices. With Microsoft OneDrive, collaboration is simple and effective. There’s no shortage of styles or templates, and everything integrates well with the rest of the Microsoft Office suite. Graphs and charts are easy to insert and personalize, with almost every element clickable and customizable. It doesn’t provide definitions like Google Sheets does, but the Formula Builder serves this function well, with detailed descriptions. The formula autofill feature makes it easy to find what you’re looking for, while the arguments tooltip is a helpful mnemonic aid. Microsoft Excel was built for manipulating data and includes over 400 distinct operations.

Free spreadsheets for windows 10