Learn Microsoft Excel

If you want to learn Microsoft Excel, you're in the right place. There is a lot to learn about Microsoft Excel, and not everything is in the manual. We've got a range of free online lessons on how to get the best out of Excel, starting from the basics right up to advanced subjects. We'll help you to do your job better - with the right Excel skills you could even get a raise or a better job! If you don't see what you want to learn, why not get in touch and suggest a lesson we should write.

If you want to learn Excel, this lesson covers ten important things that we think you need to know if you are going to use Excel effectively. Even if you've been using Excel for a while, check this lesson out to make sure you have the basics covered.

Excel's Pivot Table feature is an incredibly powerful tool that makes it easy to tabulate and summarise data in your spreadsheets, particularly if your data changes a lot. This lesson will show you how to create a simple pivot table in Excel to summarize a set of daily sales data for a team of several sales people.

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XLOOKUP is a new function for Excel that will replace VLOOKUP for most Excel users. In this lesson, we look at how XLOOKUP works and provide some practical examples of how to use it. In one function, XLOOKUP provides the same features that VLOOKUP and HLOOKUP offer separately, and is more powerful and easier to use. XLOOKUP also removes the need to use the INDEX/MATCH combination that allows you to work around some of VLOOKUP's shortcomings.

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There are a variety of ways to add up the numbers found in two or more cells in Excel. This lesson shows you how to use the SUM function to add up cells, rows and columns of cells in Excel.

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VLOOKUP allows you to look for a specified value in a column of data inside a table, and then fetch a value from another column in the same row. An example might be where you need to find the sales for a specific salesperson from within a monthly sales report. In this lesson you'll learn how to use VLOOKUP in your spreadsheets by walking you through several simple examples. The lesson will also highlight some shortcomings of VLOOKUP, plus a solution to those shortcomings.

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This lesson shows you how to write formulas using INDEX and MATCH to let you perform lookups that VLOOKUP can't, and which run much faster on large lookup tables than VLOOKUP. This lesson explains how INDEX and MATCH work on their own, and then shows you how to write an INDEX MATCH formula that can look left as well as right, and performs much faster than VLOOKUP on large tables.

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If you have a spreadsheet with time values that have been added to the spreadsheet as text values, you need the TIMEVALUE function. This will allow you to convert the text values into valid time values. A common scenario where this might be useful is when you've been provided data to import into Excel, and the times in the imported data are not recognised by Excel as valid times.

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If you work with large Excel spreadsheets, you'll probably know the hassle of scrolling left and right, up and down as you try to work with all that data. You can use the Zoom feature to make the spreadsheet smaller and fit more onto the screen, but that doesn't always give you the result you want. Often, it will make your spreadsheet too small or not small enough.

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Sometimes you need to count the number of cells in a spreadsheet that contain a value or set of values. The COUNTIF function allows you to do this by counting only those cells in the range that meet the criteria you set. This lesson explains how to use COUNTIF, and provides an example of how you can use it.

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If you have formatted a cell and want to use the same formatting for another cell or cells, you can easily copy the formatting from that cell to as many additional cells as you like.

When creating a chart in Excel, Excel will default to inserting your new chart on the same worksheet that contains the data you created it from. This lesson shows you various options for moving or resizing your chart so it looks how you want it to, where you want it to be.

The COUNTIFS function in Excel counts the number of cells in a range that match a set of multiple criteria. COUNTIFS extends the COUNTIF function which only allows one criteria. It is similar to SUMIFS, which will find the sum of all cells that match a set of multiple criteria. This lesson shows you how to use COUNTIFS and provides some practical examples to help you understand how it works.

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The SUMIFS function in Excel allows you to sum the values in a range of cells that meet multiple conditions, or criteria. For example, you might use the SUMIFS function in a sales spreadsheet to to add up the value of sales of a specific product by a given sales person (e.g. the value of all sales of a microwave oven made by John). This lesson explains how to use SUMIFS.

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Once you get used to using Excel, you can find that using the mouse to select data in your spreadsheet is somewhat slow and time consuming. Here's a quick technique for selecting a range of cells in Excel.

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The MATCH() function allows you to find the position of a value in a list. For example, in a list of weekdays starting with Monday, MATCH() would return a value of 3 for Wednesday. This lesson explains how to use the MATCH() function in Microsoft Excel, explains where you might use it, and provides a real world example of the MATCH() function in action.

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Excel Formulas

Do you need help with an Excel formula or function? We have lessons on a range of different Excel functions, and the list is growing all the time.

Click here to see the full list of Excel Formulas and Functions