This blog is an update to “Significance of Excel Spreadsheet for Finance and Accounting Data Entry”
Spreadsheets play a key role in managing data for any business. Earlier, companies relied only on MS – Excel for record keeping or to figure out budgets, till Google introduced its innovative spreadsheet software in 2006. Though Google spreadsheets and Microsoft Excel are similar in many ways, there are huge differences between both. Services of an experienced data entry company come useful when it becomes difficult for businesses to handle all the computer applications they use. An STL training report based on 2,000 office employees, discussed in Mirror finds that half of the employers admitted not fully understanding popular programs like Microsoft Word and Excel, with spreadsheets and presentations causing the biggest headaches. Many workers also feel that they have a skills gap around key computer applications.
Both the programs have many of the same features and are ideal for performing complex calculations, for storing, analyzing and filtering structured data, generating keywords, or for creating any standard operating procedures.
Google Sheets vs. Microsoft Excel
While Excel is easy to use, the file needs to be saved manually. At the same time Google sheets will be saved automatically.
Both Google spreadsheets and MS Excel are useful for diverse purposes in handling business as well as individual data. Professional companies providing data entry services will be aware of all the features related to both the programs and how to use it for concerned businesses.In our next blog, we’ll discuss how to convert Google Sheet files into Excel files.
| Google Sheet | Microsoft Excel | |
| Sharing and collaboration | Google Sheet enables users to collaborate in real-time. Multiple people can work on a spreadsheet simultaneously. Data can be easily stored to the cloud as well. It has clean versioning control and the sharing settings also allow Google Sheets to be shared easily. Users have control over who can see their document, edit and comment on it. Any edits and comments made can be seen in real time as well. | Though Microsoft Excel allows sharing and collaboration, Google Sheets are more advanced in this concern. Users can share Excel files only via email and they can’t enjoy the same level of collaboration as with the Google sheet. The recent change is that those using Office 365 can now get access to tracked edit page and similar options for seeing activity from other users. |
| Offline access | Though Google sheets can be used in both online and offline mode, users may find difficulty in accessing files that were previously created online. In such cases, an offline extension needed to be installed to work on files offline. It often happens that this extension doesn’t work correctly. | At the same time, Excel can be used only in offline mode. So, for offline work purposes, Excel is the most suitable one. Also now users can set their excel files to automatically sync via OneDrive as soon as they regain internet access. |
| Data analysis and visualization | Though both the programs have the features of calculation and analysis of data,Google sheets are not that perfect as Excel for data visualization. To create flow charts on Google sheet, users have to do them manually. However Google Sheets are free and by adding macros, Sheets can be considered as a viable alternative to Excel for most spreadsheet users. | For serious data analysis or visualization, Excel is ideal. Excel comes with more formula stored than sheets, and even financial models can be created with ease. Excel also accommodates pivot table, filtering, conditional formatting, and other data visualization tools. For creating a flowchart in Excel, the inbuilt formula can be accessed in excel, making the job easier for any project. |
| Security | Data is more secure, as Google Sheets store files exclusively in the cloud, from where it is hard to lose files. Google uses HTTPS (the secure version of the web, compared to the unsecured “HTTP” version. Users can also turn on 2-Step Verification for Google Drive. But it can handle only 5,000,000 cells. | Compared to Sheets, Excel is poor in securing data. Though password-protection facility is available, files can be easily hacked. However with 17,179,869,184 cells, Microsoft Excel can handle large budget files. |
