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If you’ve been using Excel from your desktop for years, switching to the online version can seem like a scary — and even unnecessary — transition.

But Excel Online is free, and offers additional advantages to using the desktop version. If you use the Online version, you can sync your spreadsheet to other web apps, allowing you to gather additional data or automate workflows.

Better yet, using Excel Online helps you collaborate with coworkers on larger projects.

Excel Online is a fantastic option for gathering, viewing, and analyzing your data. Even if you haven’t paid for Excel’s desktop version, you can begin using Excel Online for free today. And Excel Online offers almost all the same features, so if you’re interested in collaboration or taking advantage of the web add-ons, it could be worth the switch.

Here, we’ll investigate how to use Excel Online, compare the features of Excel Online versus desktop Excel, and take a look at some of the hidden online features you’ll definitely want to know about.

How to Use Excel Online: Beginner’s Guide

There are two ways to locate Excel Online: first, click this Products.Office link, and select “Excel.” It will ask you to sign in, and then you can begin creating a spreadsheet.

Or, open OneDrive, and select a spreadsheet you’ve saved.

If you want to move your desktop spreadsheets to Excel Online, you can use OneDrive.com to do this — there are two different ways.

First, you can open OneDrive.com and drag and drop your spreadsheet files from your desktop to OneDrive.

However, dragging and dropping files means if you edit those files online, your edits won’t transfer to your desktop. If you want to switch back and forth between the two, this can become problematic.

Another option for moving desktop spreadsheets to Excel Online is downloading the OneDrive app, logging in with your Microsoft account, and copying your Excel files to the OneDrive folder to sync them.

This option is likely more favorable. After downloading the OneDrive app, you can sync your files to the cloud. Then, any edits you make online will automatically transfer to your desktop files, and vice versa.

Once you’re all set up in Excel, you can use it the same way you use the desktop version — the design is the same, and most of the functions are the same.

Now, let’s take a closer look at Excel Online’s features, so you know exactly what Online includes.

Excel Online Features

Excel 2016 desktop version offers 471 functions.

Excel Online offers over 400 functions, and it supports many additional functions if you input them correctly, except a few. This makes desktop and Online almost completely comparable in function.

Here’s Microsoft Office’s complete list of features offered in Excel Online, verus Excel desktop.

It’s important to note while charts, tables, PivotChart reports, and PivotTable reports are displayed similarly in Excel Online, there are a few charts unsupported Online. These include: charts that are part of a group of charts, charts that rely on external references, and charts that use certain kinds of data sources that are not supported for workbooks.

However, the majority of Excel’s most important features are supported equally in Excel Online. For instance, calculations, cells, dates, external references, fields lists for a PivotChart or PivotTable report, filters, slices, and timeline controls, formatting, named items, sparklines, and tables, are all available features in Excel Online.

If there’s a feature unsupported in Excel Online, but the majority of your project can be completed in Excel Online, perhaps you can work back and forth between Online and desktop, using OneDrive to sync your data automatically.

Excel Online Conditional Formatting

If you’re worried about conditional formatting with Excel Online, you shouldn’t be.

Excel Online supports conditional formatting. To use conditional formatting Online, select your data range, and then go to Home > Conditional Formatting. From there, you can pick your style.

If you use conditional formatting on your desktop Excel, you will still see the changes to your workbook when you open it in Excel Online.

Hidden Functions Online

Last, but certainly not least, let’s dive into some functions you might not know about for Excel Online specifically.

We’ve talked a lot about similarities between Excel Online and desktop, but if they were just similar, there’d be no point choosing Online over desktop.

Here are a few features that make Excel Online unique.

1. Surveys

If you use Excel on a desktop, you need to use third-party survey makers to gather survey information. If you use Excel Online, you don’t need the extra step — you can create a survey directly within the site.

To create a survey in Excel Online, click New > Forms for Excel.

Next, name your Survey and click “Create”. Select “Add Question” to add a new question to the survey. You can choose to add Choice, Text, Rating, or Date questions.

Images courtesy of Microsoft Office Support.

Click “Preview” at the top of the window to see how your survey will look on a computer. Once you’re happy with it, click “Submit”.

2. Install Add-ons

There are plenty of add-ons available for Excel Online. To find them, go to Insert > Office Add-ins. You can choose an add-on by category or name, and then click the “Add” button. After installing, you must click the “Start” button to use the add-on.

3. Share Your Spreadsheet

Similar to Google Docs, you can share your Excel files with other people, and either let those people edit, or simply view your data. Within your sheet, simply click the “Share” button at the top right corner. Within the pop-up, you can either choose “Edit” or “View” permissions, and then generate a link to share with anyone.

4. Leave a Comment

Let’s say you’ve created an Excel sheet with a coworker, and you want to tell her something about a particular section of data. Rather than confusing her with a lengthy email explaining what and where, you can simply comment within the spreadsheet.

To add a comment, select a cell or section and then right click and select “Insert Comment.” You can also go to Insert > Comment.

There are certainly plenty of other tips, tricks, and fun features available solely within Excel Online. Give it a try for yourself, and let us know on Twitter if you find any other impressive online features.

Every once in a while, I’ll come across a website that really makes me stop and think. So, I found 20 of them to show you.

These sites push the boundaries of what is known to be possible on the web. Whether it’s the design aesthetic, usability, interactivity, sound design, or value that the site provides, each one is a masterpiece in its respective industry, and something to be inspired by.

Not surprisingly, many organizations exist to highlight these sites and the contributions they make to the web. To help surface some of the most inspirational designs, I gathered 15 award-winners that have made their way through several key awards organizations — including Awwwards, UX Awards, The Webby Awards, SiteInspire, Best Website Gallery, and FWA.

I also found five more websites whose homepage designs are just plain cool and worth learning from.

As you browse through the list, know that each site excels in its own way and seeks to serve a unique purpose. While one site may be an excellent example of visual design, another may be an excellent example of interactivity. This means that not all of these sites may be “conversion machines” or blueprint ideas that you can easily copy over to your site.

Rather, they’re great ways to gain some website design inspiration and see the cutting-edge marketing that’s happening in the different corners of the web.

Beautiful Award-Winning Websites

1. Feed

Award: Site of the Day (6/6/2015), Awwwards

Not only is Feed an interesting concept, but it also has a stunning execution that challenges our understanding of what is possible on the web. Through a creative blend of animation and video, the site immerses the user into a very engaging experience. As an atypical site, it contains several unique usability elements as well, including a navigation that doubles as a scroll progress bar.

Featured by Awwwards

2. crypton.trading

Award: Site of the Day (4/3/2018), Awwwards

Meet crypton.trading, your robot accountant.

Crypton.trading is a trading hub for cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, using artificial intelligence to predict changes in a currency’s value and identify key buying and selling opportunities. The website was rated high for its development and design, as it gradually explains more of the developer’s methods the further down visitors scroll.

This award-winning website makes tech-savvy visitors feel right at home the moment Crypton’s greeting appears across the homepage, one letter at a time.

Featured by Awwwards

3. ETQ

Award: Site of the Day (5/19/2015), Awwwards

ETQ takes a very minimalistic approach to ecommerce with their stripped-down site with big, compelling visuals of their product. Simple, flat, color-based backgrounds accompanied by strong typography help to keep the focus on exactly what the user came there to see: shoes.

Featured by Awwwards

4. Mikiya Kobayashi

Award: Site of the Day (7/4/2015), Awwwards

Mikiya is a Product Designer with a minimalistic portfolio that showcases his work through strong photography and subtle animations. His full site was originally created in Japanese and then translated into English, helping demonstrate the international scalability of his design.

Featured by Awwwards

5. Inside Abbey Road

Award: Best Music Website, 2016 Webby Awards

Google knocked it out of the park with this highly interactive site, which allows users to step into the Abbey Road Studios. Brilliant sound design, navigation mechanics, and visuals mixed with the usual “Google flair” all help draw visitors in to this well-made web property.

Featured by The Webby Awards

6. Citrix: The New Mobile Workforce

Award: Site of the Day (11/23/2017), Best Website Gallery

This website — dedicated to Red Bull’s partnership with Citrix, a cloud-based software company — is amazing.

The New Mobile Workforce, a site owned by Citrix, uses panoramic photography to show visitors how Citrix is supporting Red Bull Racing’s new race car. Even if you’re not a car-racing enthusiast, the website’s clever animations to explain a complicated automotive technology are hard to ignore.

Featured by Best Website Gallery

7. The History of Climate Change

Award: Site of the Day (6/23/2015), Awwwards

Follow the footsteps of Luc Jacquet as Wild-Touch takes you along this visual and educational journey about the history of global climate change. A mixture of historical media and unique animations help tell the story.

Featured by Awwwards

8. Beagle

Award: Site of the Day (4/19/2015), Best Website Gallery

Beagle does an exceptional job of visually and progressively telling the story of their product in a simple and easy-to-digest way. This is a major challenge for many startups, especially when they’re introducing new concepts to existing markets. People want to know, “What is your product? How does it work? Why do I care?” Beagle answers all those questions while simultaneously showing off their product and compelling the user to purchase. Plus, they’re one of few sites that actually implemented “scroll hijacking” correctly.

Featured by Best Website Gallery

9. Southwest: Heart of Travel

Award: Best Visual Design – Aesthetic, 2018 Webby Awards

When Southwest Airlines wanted to prove its customers were “more than just a dollar sign,” the company created a website whose design was assembled using the shapes of their customers’ flightpaths.

The website, called Heart of Travel, even allows visitors to create their own artwork out of a trip they might plan on taking. In this way, Southwest’s website is a product of their most loyal passengers.

Featured by The Webby Awards

10. Woven Magazine

Award: Site of the Day (4/4/2015), Best Website Gallery

Woven is an online publication that celebrates artists, craftsmen, and makers alike. To me, they represent a confirmation that publications can (and should) have beautiful, engaging sites with easy-to-read content. Free of distractions like pop-ups and obtrusive ads, this site all about the experience of the content itself.

Featured by Best Website Gallery

11. JOHO’s Bean

Award: FWA of the Day (8/7/2015), Favorite Website Awards

The website for JOHO’s Bean has incredible imagery, interactivity, story telling, visual design, and most of all, sound engineering. These all come together to create a compelling, emotional, and engaging site that tells the story of a coffee bean’s journey.

Featured by FWA

12. NOWNESS

Award: Best Cultural Blog/Website, 2017 Webby Awards

Nowness is perhaps the coolest crowdsourced video blog on the internet today. That was a mouthful … what does all that mean?

NOWNESS‘s “crowdsourced” nature is part of what makes it an award-winner. This means most of its content comes from independent creatives — an increasingly popular way for businesses to publish content. NOWNESS is also a video blog, meaning all of its blog content is in video format. Together, these qualities help make Nowness a captivating hub for the stories that brands everywhere strive to tell.

Featured by The Webby Awards

13. Virgin America

Award: Most Significant Industry Evolution, 2014 UX Awards

In a world where airline websites are known to be riddled with major usability issues, Virgin America has one of the best websites that pushes usability, accessibility, and responsive design forward. In fact, it’s been named as the first truly responsive airline website, a new precedent in the industry.

Featured by UX Awards

14. World of SWISS

Award: Best User Interface, 2015 Webby Awards

Another airline?! What is happening?! Yep, SWISS airlines built an incredibly immersive site that tells their story and describes what it’s like to fly with them — and they simply did too great of a job to be ignored. Strong visuals and animations introduce the user to different sections of the site that are packed with information beyond the usual sales and marketing pitch that is so common today.

Featured by The Webby Awards

15. Reductress

Award: Best Humor Website, 2018 Webby Awards

It’s not that hard to make someone laugh on the internet; so much of what we read and consume online is meant to be entertaining. But it is hard to do it consistently for a large audience. Reductress is a satirical magazine whose headlines and general reading experience are top-tier in the humor department — making the website itself a quality property.

Featured by The Webby Awards

Other Cool Website Designs

16. Minimums

Minimums takes a very bold approach to the way that they display their content, leveraging a grid-based website design, big typography, and full-width, high-quality images. Their site serves as a really nice example for how to properly execute a grid structure while still maintaining a nice visual hierarchy in the design.

17. Guillaume Tomasi

As a Photographer in Montreal, Guillaume Tomasi has built a portfolio that’s truly fit to house his unique and awe-inspiring photography. His surreal photo style is juxtaposed by his simple, flat, empty, and minimalistic portfolio design that places all of the focus on the work itself.

His unique series navigation coupled with art-gallery-inspired work introductions and perfect scrolling interactions yield an experience reminiscent of that of a real gallery.

18. The District

This branding agency takes its imagery seriously, and it should — it handles all channels of media for their clients. The District’s website, alone, is a journey through some of the most beautiful artwork and photography you’ve ever seen.

These provocative tiles change rapidly as you explore the website, and the wackier they seem, the more interested you become in learning about their past work.

19. Tej Chauhan

Tej Chauhan has turned impressionist artwork into a business model with this intriguing website. Each image on this product developer’s homepage slides out to cover the previous image, offering little context around the object you now see in front of you.

But isn’t that lack of context exactly what makes you want to learn more? The tagline, “Souvenirs of The Near Future,” suggests these objects are a part of their product line — and an opportunity for you to get these innovative objects into your life.

20. Amanda Martocchio Architecture

An architecture firm might not specialize in web development, but its website should still demonstrate its commitment to visually pleasing design. Amanda Martocchio took that to heart with this gorgeous website.

It’s no secret that Amanda Martocchio Architecture loves its work — each picture on the homepage of its website is an enchanting shot of the houses the company designs. The website labels every house you scroll through with the type of design that was intended, along with numerous angles to each building.

Want more website design examples? Check out these amazing product pages you’ll want to copy immediately.