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Microsoft Office Excel VS Notion

Compare Microsoft Office Excel VS Notion and see what are their differences

Microsoft Office Excel logo Microsoft Office Excel

Microsoft Office Excel is a commercial spreadsheet application.

Notion logo Notion

All-in-one workspace. One tool for your whole team. Write, plan, and get organized.
  • Microsoft Office Excel Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-04-21
  • Notion Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-12

Microsoft Office Excel features and specs

  • Comprehensive Features
    Excel offers extensive functionalities such as pivot tables, advanced charting, macros, and formulas, making it a powerful tool for data analysis and visualization.
  • User-Friendly Interface
    Excel has an intuitive interface with easy-to-navigate menus and commands, which makes it accessible for both beginners and advanced users.
  • High Compatibility
    Excel files can be easily shared and accessed across different devices and platforms, ensuring compatibility with other Microsoft Office products and third-party software.
  • Strong Community and Support
    A large online community, extensive documentation, and professional support from Microsoft ensure users can find help and resources quickly.
  • Regular Updates
    Microsoft frequently releases updates that add new features, improve performance, and enhance security, ensuring the tool remains up-to-date with user needs.

Possible disadvantages of Microsoft Office Excel

  • Cost
    Excel requires a subscription to Microsoft Office 365 or a one-time purchase of Office Suite, which can be expensive for individual users or small businesses.
  • Resource Intensive
    Large datasets and complex calculations can cause Excel to become slow and consume significant system resources, impacting overall computer performance.
  • Learning Curve
    While basic functionalities are accessible, mastering Excel's more advanced features requires substantial time and effort, posing a challenge for new users.
  • Limited Collaboration Features
    Despite improvements, Excel's real-time collaboration features can lag behind those of dedicated collaborative tools like Google Sheets, especially when multiple users are editing a document simultaneously.
  • Error-Prone
    User errors, such as incorrect formulas or misentered data, can lead to significant issues in data accuracy and analysis, necessitating diligent review and oversight.

Notion features and specs

  • All-in-One Workspace
    Notion combines note-taking, task management, databases, calendars, and collaboration features in a single platform, reducing the need for multiple tools.
  • Highly Customizable
    Users can tailor Notion to fit their specific workflow with customizable templates, pages, and databases, making it versatile for various use cases.
  • Collaboration Features
    Notion offers seamless collaboration with real-time editing, comments, mentions, and shared workspaces, enhancing teamwork and productivity.
  • Cross-Platform Availability
    Notion is available on multiple platforms, including web, desktop, and mobile, providing flexibility and accessibility from anywhere.
  • Integration Capability
    Notion supports integrations with various third-party applications like Google Drive, Slack, and Trello, allowing for a more interconnected workflow.

Possible disadvantages of Notion

  • Learning Curve
    Due to its extensive features and customization options, new users might find Notion challenging to learn and navigate initially.
  • Performance Issues
    Some users report that Notion can become slow or experience lag, especially with large databases and complex pages.
  • Offline Limitations
    While Notion offers some offline capabilities, its functionality is significantly reduced without an internet connection, which can be inconvenient for some users.
  • Pricing for Teams
    Though Notion offers a free version, its premium plans can be expensive for larger teams, which may be a constraint for startups or small businesses.
  • Privacy Concerns
    As with any cloud-based service, there are potential privacy and data security concerns, especially for users handling sensitive information.

Microsoft Office Excel videos

Michael Net Worth

More videos:

  • Tutorial - How to use review tab(Microsoft Excel part-6)
  • Tutorial - How To Pass Microsoft Excel Test - Get ready for the Interview
  • Review - Microsoft Excel Review Tab All Option,Ms Excel के review Tab को जानिए हिंदी में,Ms excel Review Tab!

Notion videos

The Most Powerful Productivity App I Use - Notion

More videos:

  • Review - I switched to Notion for a week... Here's what happened!
  • Review - Notion is Truly an All-in-One Productivity Tool (App Review)

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Microsoft Office Excel and Notion)
Spreadsheets
100 100%
0% 0
Productivity
0 0%
100% 100
Project Management
16 16%
84% 84
Office Suites
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Microsoft Office Excel and Notion

Microsoft Office Excel Reviews

  1. amna123
    · content writter at content arcade ·
    Unleashing the Potential with Microsoft Office Excel

    A software program created by Microsoft that uses spreadsheets to organize numbers and data with formulas and functions. It is one of the best software for daily use Microsoft Office Excel has been an absolute game-changer for me in the realm of spreadsheet applications. Whether it's managing data, creating intricate formulas, or visualizing trends, Excel stands out as a powerhouse of functionality and efficiency.

    👍 Pros:    Database management
    👎 Cons:    Learning curve
  2. Everyone loves to hate it, but it's the best!

    What would we do without Excel!? Sure, the online version isn't as simple as Google Sheets, they could have chosen not to localise the function names, and it's always chaos trying to consolidate multiple budget or forecast files & templates, but aside from that it's everyone's favourite spreadsheet. What you can't do in Excel isn't worth doing. Even if there's often a better way...

  3. Rosstaylor9855
    Reliable Software

    It is one of the best software for daily purpose.


11 Alternatives to QuickBooks in 2024
Tiller takes all of your information—your bank accounts, credit cards and investment accounts—and feeds them directly into a Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets file. From there, you can design your own spreadsheets to your own liking, or use one of Tiller’s pre-made templates. Tiller offers a 30-day trial here, and the full version costs $79/year.
Source: www.bench.co
Top 10 Data Analysis Tools in 2022
Microsoft Excel Microsoft Excel allows the direct addition of analog data from a picture to a fully editable format in Excel. Microsoft 365 Business Basic subscription costs $6/user/month. Microsoft Excel is a very efficient tool for small businesses in processing and conducting calculations on data. However, Excel is relatively old, which means limited features in terms of...

Notion Reviews

  1. jk22
    · consultant at GFI ·
    Notion has helped in documenting our business

    It's been very very helpful to streamline different people on our team, especially remote workers to help them understand what's going on in our business without 100s of meetings.

    👍 Pros:    Ui is very attractive|Easy to use|Great for collaboration|Good customer service|Free to use
    👎 Cons:    Steep learning curve
  2. Ramesh Kumar
    · Product Manager at Aerial ·
    Extremely helpful- made life easier

    My remote-first start-up has eliminated more than 200+ hours of meetings and 1000s of mismanaged documents because our entire communication happens through Notion.

    👍 Pros:    Clean ui|File sharing|Modular
    👎 Cons:    Learning curve
  3. Boyd Richardson
    · Writer at SE ·

    As someone who's always on the lookout for the perfect productivity app, I was excited to try out Notion. It promises to be an all-in-one tool for everything from note-taking to project management to personal wikis.

    From the moment you open Notion, you can tell that it's different from other productivity apps. The interface is sleek and modern, and it's easy to navigate. The app is divided into pages, which can be customized with different templates to fit your needs. You can create to-do lists, databases, wikis, calendars, and more.

    One of the things I love about Notion is the ability to create relationships between pages. For example, you can create a database of your favorite books and then link to a page with your book reviews. Or you can create a to-do list and link to a page with notes about the task. This feature makes it easy to keep all of your information in one place and to connect related items.

    🏁 Competitors: Microsoft Loop
    👍 Pros:    Highly customizable|All in one|Collaboration|Cross platform
    👎 Cons:    Steep learning curve

Top 10 Notion Alternatives for 2025 and Why Teams Are Choosing Ledger
If you're looking for a Notion alternative that supports real, scalable teamwork, you're not alone. Whether you’ve outgrown Notion or are just exploring more robust, team-friendly platforms, here’s a breakdown of the top 10 alternatives in 2025—and why Ledger is becoming the go-to choice for modern teams.
How Tight-Knit Teams Get More Done with Innovative Project Management Tools
Notion: More than a task manager, it acts as a knowledge base. You can store guidelines, references, wikis, and to-do lists all under one roof.
Source: medium.com
11 Popular Knowledge Management Tools to Consider in 2025 
Notion AI (Optional Add-on) – $8 per user/month (billed annually). Available for all plans (including the free plan)
Source: knowmax.ai
11 Best Google Keeps Alternatives for 2024
Unlike other note-taking apps, Notion stands out for its endless customization. It’s like an all-in-one workspace structured by pages and blocks.
Source: upbase.io
20 Obsidian Alternatives: Top Note-Taking Tools to Consider
Notion is a popular alternative to Obsidian for its simplicity, minimalistic interface, and large community. On top of note-taking, you can use Notion as a task management tool to create simple to-dos or build a personal knowledge base. You can also embed links, images, videos, code snippets, etc. Notion also has bi-directional functionalities enabling you to interconnect...
Source: clickup.com

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Notion seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 441 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Microsoft Office Excel mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of Microsoft Office Excel yet. Tracking of Microsoft Office Excel recommendations started around Mar 2021.

Notion mentions (441)

  • Cool SHIT you can do with docker
    Two of the most popular open source note taking app are affine (basically notion but open source) and obsidian (which stores notes in markdown). - Source: dev.to / 6 months ago
  • Ask HN: Who is hiring? (October 2024)
    Notion | https://notion.so | Android Engineer | SF | hybrid (in office 2x a week) | Full time
      Level: Mid/Mid+ (4-6yrs experience).
    - Source: Hacker News / 7 months ago
  • Karyam: Simples everyday writing app
    Advanced Notion and Google Doc writing editor. - Source: dev.to / 11 months ago
  • My blog post workflow
    I manage my non-work and work-adjacent tasks in Notion. Whenever I have an idea, regardless of how big or small or silly or achievable it is, I'll add it to Notion, and use labels to categorise it by type of output (e.g. blog, silly project, website update). Today I wanted to write a short post for my site. I clicked on the filtered blog post view, and selected this one (because I hoped it would be a quick one!). - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • 6 AI tools that feels illegal to know🤖
    Notion.so redefines workspaces. With its intelligent organization and collaboration features, it's more than a productivity tool—it's a digital haven. Discover the art of streamlined and efficient teamwork. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Microsoft Office Excel and Notion, you can also consider the following products

Google Sheets - Synchronizing, online-based word processor, part of Google Drive.

Trello - Infinitely flexible. Incredibly easy to use. Great mobile apps. It's free. Trello keeps track of everything, from the big picture to the minute details.

LibreOffice - Calc - LibreOffice Calc is the spreadsheet program you've always needed. A fork of OpenOffice.

Asana - Asana project management is an effort to re-imagine how we work together, through modern productivity software. Fast and versatile, Asana helps individuals and groups get more done.

Tableau - Tableau can help anyone see and understand their data. Connect to almost any database, drag and drop to create visualizations, and share with a click.

Evernote - Bring your life's work together in one digital workspace. Evernote is the place to collect inspirational ideas, write meaningful words, and move your important projects forward.