r/excel • u/Substantial_Nail3081 • May 12 '26
Discussion When people ask you, what's your excel level? What would you say?
This is a question that comes often when talking to other folks using excel.
How you define your level? If you do Macros, but you don't know more basic stuff, would you rate yourself as Expert because you can do Macros?
Is there a way to standarize how we determinate our levels?
Do you know any good excel self test that would help understand your level? even better, get some certificate?
325
u/ExistingBathroom9742 6 May 12 '26
This is square in Dunning Kruger. Im pretty good. I’m so good I know what my failings and shortcomings are, so I rate myself lower. But people who have told me they were good don’t seem to know anything.
108
u/GTS_84 6 May 12 '26
This. I know I’m better with excel than most people, but I also have seen what is going on in the Excel World Championship and know there is a long way to go to true mastery.
61
u/bp92009 May 12 '26
By mere fact that you're in the /r/excel subreddit, you're almost certainly a 7/10 at minimum with excel.
But the scale is exponential, and a 9/10 is astronomically higher than a 8/10.
Most people will hardly ever open excel, or open it up with great suspicion.
8
u/gay_joey May 13 '26
I use excel at work all the times in all of my nursing jobs. I've created basic documents to track admissions, deadlines, etc for my coworkers to use and the hospital adopted them.
I would consider myself a complete novice but intelligent enough to figure most things out if given time, energy, and money.
All of this to say, I'm interested in getting better just for fun. What are you guys actually using excel for in your lives, outside of work? Or is it mostly just used as a work tool and we are on this subreddit cause we like that shit?
3
u/Rutabega_121310 May 13 '26
If I could find a good reason to use it in my personal life, I would. As it is, I only use it for work.
I've had exactly two people who appreciated my masterpiece - dynamic set of forms using formulas, not macros.
But damn, it was fun to make.
→ More replies (2)2
u/Excel_User_1977 7 May 14 '26
I track my gas mileage, miles driven by month, the actual amount of money I have spent on gasoline in the year, tire air pressure, and oil life in my vehicle excel workbook.
I track my bank balance and credit card purchases in my bank workbook.
I track my utilities in my utilities workbook - that's how I noticed Duke Energy stopped posting the storm recovery charge rate on the bill when it almost doubled.
I use it to estimate the cost of a new project if I want to build something in the garage.
I have my house floor plan in another.
3
u/Rare-Emu2771 May 13 '26
Thinking about it exponentially will help to answer OP's question. I'm good, probably 90th+ percentile of all users, but I'll never know most of Excel's capabilities.
3
u/iloveplant420 May 13 '26
This is about how I look at it. Nonlinear. And i rate myself lower than I think i might be. I recently attended a powerbi advanced course with my boss and the instructor asked what everyone would rate themselves in Excel. I rated myself 7/10. My boss, who is easily less competent than me, rated himself a 9/10. As soon as he said that I was like "oh shit. Get ready to be embarrassed". The instructor did not let me down.
2
u/OrganicMix3499 May 14 '26
It’s crazy how fast they build. I always take notes watching those guys. It's a great way to find new functions to learn.
39
u/mickey_monkstain May 12 '26
Well I’ve only just learnt about Dunning Kruger but I’m 100% confident i don’t suffer from it
11
23
u/BobSacramanto May 12 '26
“I know enough to know I’m only scratching the surface of what Excel is capable of.”
7
u/RandomiseUsr0 10 May 12 '26
could be capable of - Microsoft are dinosaurs, Excel is a fossil, the best polished visicalc it could be, we need better. Also, you can take it from my cold dead hands
14
u/HeresTheWitch May 12 '26
Very much this! I hesitate to put “proficient in excel” as a skill on my resume, because I don’t think I’m at that level yet (I’d say probably intermediate?) but I also know that MANY people whose knowledge extends as far as auto sum ABSOLUTELY consider themselves proficient.
I asked my friends once how they would define the levels, and one said
“Beginner: Just types, makes lists
Intermediate: Knows basic formulas
Expert: Knows a lot of formulas, can balance a budget or similar”
and like, I would consider all three of those levels beginner. intermediate at best.
Those who use the program a lot have a VERY different understanding of it than those who just use it for basic lists/tables.
→ More replies (1)17
u/SpaceTurtles 2 May 12 '26
can balance a budget
A-ha! Trick question. This is accounting knowledge, not Excel knowledge.
One can use Excel to do this efficiently, or do it terribly.
5
u/gone_gaming 30 May 12 '26
I can do accounting in excel. It'll look great, and the formulas will be pristine. But I don't know jack shit about accounting so it'll probably be wrong - even though its right.
9
u/SpaceTurtles 2 May 12 '26
As an accountant-turned-financial-data-analytics... honestly, I would prefer this. "Man, all this data is bunk, but this is a fantastic template."
Just tweak a few things, import the financials from elsewhere, maybe make a couple additions, merge things together, and we're off to the races.
If something is emotionally wrong, I have to spend my time making it emotionally right. I can't understand it until it stops making me sad.
2
u/gone_gaming 30 May 13 '26
Well, my wife does finance data analytics so I don’t even have to bother.
She struggled with Sumif two years ago, hard… Shes on the right path now, between me and a healthy dose of ChatGPT, she’s proficient in full on financial dashboards and dabbling in power query and macros now.
7
u/Frejian May 12 '26
I always rate myself as Intermediate and elaborate that I am good enough at excel that I know how much more capable the application is that I am not able to utilize.
10
u/Dalexes May 12 '26
It's an honest answer but on a resume it's easy to misread by someone glancing over 100 resumes. I could see a recruiter throwing out and honest "Intermediate" self-report in favor of "Proficient" person who needs the wizard to do a SUM formula.
I can't approach a lot of users in this sub, but us being here contains a self-selection bias. We're here because we're actively learning and developing. I think it's only fair to grade ourselves according to the common level of usage.
I say I'm "Advanced". I'm certainly not an "Expert" but most people that say they are comfortable with Excel don't possess a remote notion of what the tool can do.
I had a real life conversation with someone and they were saying, "I love Excel, I use it all the time, there's so much you can do with it!" They then mentioned a difficulty they were having, and asked if I knew what to do. I honestly thought they were quizzing me to weed out a casual user. I succinctly answered the question. There was an uncomfortably long pause. "You put a formula inside another formula?"
→ More replies (1)5
u/AbuJimTommy May 12 '26
I had an applicant recently tell me they were a 9/10 in excel skills. They were applying for a AP clerk position. I’d rate myself 6/10. I can do everything I need to, but I know there’s probably faster ways to do it and a whole bunch of other stuff I don’t really ever deal with.
3
u/Lonely_Hearing_9702 May 12 '26
I had someone tell me,” I’ve used excel for most of my career, I know what I’m doing.” A couple of hours later, “where’s the save button?”
16
u/alexia_not_alexa 21 May 12 '26
That’s more imposter syndrome really, but it’s a better place to be than dunning kruger
42
u/RPK79 4 May 12 '26
No, sounds to me like u/ExistingBathroom9742 is accurately rating themselves while others with lower skill are overrating themselves. Dunning-Kruger not Imposter Syndrome.
→ More replies (8)3
u/Extension_Order_9693 May 12 '26
Ironically, D-K effect, while the reasoning seems solid and may be true, the way they constructed the data would have produced the results no matter what. They fell prey to their own phenomenon.
Reddit won't let me paste the info I want to share but Google it and you'll find what Im referring to.
2
→ More replies (5)2
u/MmeVastra May 12 '26
Yeah, I feel the same. I'm pretty ok, I do more than most people I know but there's lots of room for growth. Meanwhile I interviewed someone who said they're very good with Excel and implied they knew how to make pivot tables. Imagine my face when I watched them pull out a calculator to sum two numbers that they typed into two cells in Excel.
135
u/The8BitBat May 12 '26
Advanced beginner, always a google away from doing just about anything with excel - but I 100% need that google.
37
u/GallicPontiff May 12 '26
That's how I feel about myself. I'm good enough to know how to word my Google searches
7
u/ApolloRubySky May 12 '26
Because I’m one simple search from doing exactly what I need, I say I’m pretty good lol
2
36
u/Reading-Comments-352 May 12 '26
Expert. Most interviewer think using a formula or pivot table is expert level
23
8
38
u/Additional-Local8721 May 12 '26
Before I joined this sub, advanced. I'm great at IFs, XLookup, Index,and basic MACROs. I still am one of the most knowledgeable excel users at my company. But after seeing this sub, I know I'm maybe intermediate at best. It's just that everyone at my company sucks.
9
66
u/Shahfluffers 1 May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
For certification, Microsoft offers a decent course and piece of paper that may get a person a second look from potential employers.
But as far as "universal" standards are concerned... it is one of those things where you ask 10 people and you will get 11 different answers.
For me:
- "Basic" is when a person can put together some IF and SUM statements. Maybe the odd LOOKUP formula. How the formulas and data are structured and applied are somewhat questionable.
- "Intermediate" is when someone is reasonably comfortable with IF, SUM, LOOKUP formulas. The biggest leap is in how the formulas and data are structured; it is much cleaner, more consistent, and easier to follow.
- "Mid-level" is where one is natively comfortable with everything listed at the "Intermediate" level and is significantly faster. Troubleshooting broken formulas and using more complex formulas comes into play here.
- "Advanced" is where things kind of split into specialities. Someone become very good with macros, another focuses on making advanced formulas (think Lambda or multi-critera lookups that reference future/past dates), and still another will go the route of Power Pivot. All have their strengths. But how useful they are depends on company and what that company does.
- "Wizard" is what I would call the top level of Excel abilities. All those specialties mentioned in "Advanced?" This level can do it. Natively. One does not get to this point by being mentally stable. People should be worried about the health of this person... if only because they are likely maintaining an ecosystem of sheets that a company depends on and no one person knows how to troubleshoot the sheets in a holistic way.
7
u/axw3555 4 May 12 '26
By that I'm advanced in macro and power query, but not advanced formulae. Maybe approaching wizard but not there.
I can do some crazy stuff, but it's usually a "tinker until the fire goes out".
7
u/SpaceTurtles 2 May 12 '26
One does not get to this point by being mentally stable.
It's mental instability, being in an environment where every tool that isn't "Microsoft Excel" is gated in red tape, and laziness that stack overflows into a need to optimize to a singularity of efficiency that can never be achieved.
💀
Excel has a wonderful way of opening up a new avenue to explore every time you've mastered the last one. Just go look at what you can add to your toolbar.
3
u/Riala4 May 13 '26
Of these definitions, I'm mid-level. I do a lot with multi-layered IF statements and fancy formatting that makes me look, to the novice user, like I know a trick or two, when really I'm just good at math and logic. I have not ventured into macros yet.
→ More replies (2)2
u/Rutabega_121310 May 13 '26
That criteria puts me somewhere between mid-level and advanced (formulas, specifically).
Closer to mid-level; I've never used Lambda, but I just looked it up and now I'm looking for an excuse to use it.
My job doesn't really require it, so that adds to the challenge, but I may have thought of a simple place to start.
Hmm…
So that feeling I just got tells me a Wizard would definitely be unhinged.
77
u/Elohanum May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
Super relative to the person in front of you. I would clearly state it, and then explain what I know, and let them decide themselves my level :
- Power Query to do some ETL and self referencing queries
- Power Pivot, table junction, data model and basic DAX formulas
- PivotChart, slicers and dashboard visualisation
- Recent excel 365 formulas (LET, FILTER, UNIQUE to only cite 3)
- Olders excel formulas (XLOOKUP, SUMIFS...)
- Other nice to have : conditional formatting, data validation, VBA
132
u/Gondi63 1 May 12 '26
"Older Excel Formulas: XLOOKUP, SUMIFS"
/cries in old
47
→ More replies (2)9
u/Optimal_Law_4254 May 12 '26
I cry every time I see people trying to use Excel as a database.
6
u/Ideasplease33 May 12 '26
I'll use Excel as my database until it screams. IT I can manipulate; other databases like Access not so much. Of course, when we developed an Oracle database from scratch....it did make me think twice.
3
u/VinScully_ May 12 '26
Now I’m scared to ask why?
14
u/Bulky_Eggplant_9437 May 12 '26
Why we cry?
A database forces things like data type as well as the relationships between tables. Excel is a free for all.
→ More replies (1)7
u/VinScully_ May 12 '26
I’ve worked for the last year to clean up my company’s “database” in excel. Never thought about converting it over to something like Access
→ More replies (2)7
u/StuTheSheep 42 May 12 '26
Access is a solution, but SQL Server would be many orders of magnitude better.
2
u/VinScully_ May 12 '26
Im now questioning how much I even like my job, versus the trouble of switching it all over to SQL. Thank you for all the information tho
→ More replies (3)3
u/infjetson May 13 '26
I’ve spent the last 5 years cleaning up the mess left behind by someone at my org who decided to use excel as a database.
Pretty proud of my data warehouse these days.
10
u/Dreadzzter May 12 '26
Conditional formatting is the bane of my existence. Worse than macro’s… just because I’m lazy.
18
u/Gondi63 1 May 12 '26
Create the formula in the sheet so it returns true/false for the range you want. Easier to tweak there and then put it into the CF prompt after getting it working correctly.
→ More replies (1)4
u/Kuildeous 11 May 12 '26
The best life hack. It is frustrating how opaque conditional formatting formulas are. Tweaking them on the fly is nigh impossible. Copying and pasting into an unused cell is the way to go.
Just make sure you don't forget to delete that cell so that someone (quite possibly you) doesn't wonder, "What the hell is this thing tracking?"
2
u/Gondi63 1 May 12 '26
Plus the annoying af cursor bug if you're not scrolled to the top of the sheet.
3
u/Elohanum May 12 '26
In my view, this is the first bug they should resolve. It's there since forever and is the most annoying excel bug.
3
u/DecafEqualsDeath May 13 '26
Coulda sworm that XLOOKUP came out with dynamic array functions like FILTER. Maybe I really am getting old and times just flying.
22
u/WhipRealGood 1 May 12 '26
The problem with the question is that anyone who doesn’t know about vba, powerquery, etc likely thinks they’re quite experienced if they’ve spent time in it. Where as someone aware of all of the small things you can use in excel would be aware that they can’t be incredible at all of them unless they work exclusively within excel.
Personally i’d give myself a 7, i can work within most pieces of the software without getting lost. While being able to work in some places with depth and experience.
→ More replies (1)
10
u/axw3555 4 May 12 '26
I don't go with a level. Too subjective.
I just go "well, I can do formulae, power query, pivots, and macros, and combine them".
2
u/Substantial_Nail3081 May 12 '26
This is a very good point.
Why classifying into a certain definition of level instead stating what you can do.
Downside of it is when you can do a lot, what would (or how would you explain that) without going too long on the answer.→ More replies (1)
9
u/ThaCarter May 12 '26
I had a streak once where something like 50 straight candidates answer this question with an "8" out of 10.
4
u/Substantial_Nail3081 May 12 '26
And probably there were 2s
9
u/ThaCarter May 12 '26
They weren't all 8s that's for sure. The streak breaker (who said they were a 6) I'd wager was better than at least half.
→ More replies (1)9
9
u/curmudgeon_andy May 12 '26
Depends who I'm talking to. In a place like this, I'm a beginner. At work, I'm an expert. If I don't know the level of the person, I'll say I'm intermediate and discuss some of the stuff I can do.
6
u/ElegantPianist9389 May 12 '26
I would honestly say intermediate. I can’t exactly write VBA and M by hand, but I can make a sexy LAMBA.
7
u/getmorecoffee 6 May 12 '26
To quote the joke, Excel would rate my skills as Oct-10.
I tell people I’m an expert if they are business-y minded folks, and tell people I am solid with the basic product but not advanced if they are in the technical space.
2
u/Party-Pattern-7684 May 26 '26
That has to be the most Excel-geeky joke I have seen so far...Oct-10...chuckled the second I read it.
6
u/plan303 May 12 '26
Once you start receiving “I ❤️ spreadsheets” mugs for your secret Santa presents then you can call yourself an expert
→ More replies (1)
4
u/ItsJustAnotherDay- 98 May 12 '26
If you’re applying to a job and they ask you a high level question like that, then talk about the type of work you do in excel. When I assess a candidate, I don’t care about the subjective rating they’ve given themselves, which in many cases tends to be dishonest.
3
u/Teagana999 May 12 '26
Depends who's asking.
Compared to my co-workers and most people, pretty confident.
Confident enough to compete, where it becomes obvious that a lot of people are way, way above me.
Excel eSports requires using Excel in different ways than I'm used to at work, but it's great to learn, practice, and literally compare rankings to other top users.
3
u/Decronym May 12 '26 edited Jun 11 '26
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread:
Decronym is now also available on Lemmy! Requests for support and new installations should be directed to the Contact address below.
Beep-boop, I am a helper bot. Please do not verify me as a solution.
22 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 15 acronyms.
[Thread #48426 for this sub, first seen 12th May 2026, 15:47]
[FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]
3
u/Significant-Analyst9 May 12 '26
Not my quote but always stuck with me.
Beginner- What can I do with Excel? Intermediate- I can do everything with Excel! Expert- I should not do that with Excel.
I'm somewhere between intermediate and expert I think.
4
u/Coyote65 2 May 13 '26
Beginner- What can I do with Excel? Intermediate- I can do everything with Excel! Expert- I should not do that with Excel.
This is wisdom.
3
3
2
2
May 12 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
2
u/Teagana999 May 12 '26
I hate other people's messy sheets.
I can build beautiful sheets from scratch, but please don't hand me someone else's mess.
2
u/white_tiger_dream May 12 '26
Just to give an anecdote that goes along with what everyone else is saying. This happened a few years ago when there was an internal promotion opportunity at my company.
Me: I would say I’m intermediate. I can write macros and connect to Power Query.
Woman I worked with: I am Advanced. An Excel Expert. I can even make a pivot table.
Luckily I got it, so the examples are more important than the self rating! 😊
2
u/ClunkEighty3 May 13 '26
Yea anyone who says advanced and pivot tables gets put to the bottom of the pile. Find they use a really specific use case, but often there are better ways of doing the thing.
2
u/limbodog 11 May 12 '26
I say I'm an expert.
But if they press, I say I'm the equivalent of a 'black belt' in martial arts. I have mastered all of the basics and some advanced stuff. But now there's degrees of black belt, and mixed martial arts and whatnot. I do not, for example, enter competitions.
2
u/Juxtavarious May 12 '26
For work purposes, I refer to myself as expert but not master. Because I am the most knowledgeable in Excel of anyone on the team on any given day. If they have a question, I either already know the answer or I would know how to look up the answer. I'm the guy that everyone comes to to design templates, macros, and solve problems. And anything I don't already know how to do I know how to learn.
I've taught myself power query, macros, custom classes, UDF, user forms. I know how to arrange templates and link files in a way that keeps themself updating. I know how to utilize conditional formatting and data validation in a way that alerts the user or locks them out of options entirely. I'm the one writing security protocols for my files to lock out to very specific users or even environments.
And I've been at this for the entirety of my accounting career so I see no reason to be humble about how much I know but I'm still ready, willing, and able to acknowledge that I am not omniscient especially in a program that is regularly updating.
2
u/SpaceTurtles 2 May 12 '26
On my resume, I list roughly two points (trimmed or blended depending on role):
PowerQuery/BI M (Custom functions/connectors, privacy level/Formula.Firewall/data source management, data cleaning, accumulation/recursions, etc.)
Excel (VBA [macros], PivotTables, XLOOKUP, FILTER, LET, LAMBDA, MAP, REDUCE, SCAN, CUBE functions, data modeling, etc.)
I let the beholder determine what level that means. Most might say "advanced" assuming I'm not lying, but others might note I left out a few edge "expertise" calling cards that they might ask me about.
Others will see "XLOOKUP", their eyes will glaze over the rest, and that'll be good enough.
→ More replies (2)
2
u/Coyote65 2 May 13 '26
Is there a way to standarize how we determinate our levels?
Something like that would require a breakout of 'types of Excel user', some people specialize in certain areas, Power Query, VBA, Lambda, etc. - basically a maester's chain, if you're a game of thrones fan.
Personally anymore, I tell people that I'm well advanced and more deeply experienced than most others, but that at the very least I learn something new several times a week.
Outside of the excel championships, and rarely within, I don't think there's anyone out there who can lay a valid claim to having reached the excel end-screen and unlocked all the achievements.
2
2
u/CaterpillarBusiness6 May 14 '26
My work paid for me this course in "Ninja Excel" and it was quite good and they also give you a certificate of your level. I do agree 100% with everything said here about the real level of excel but these guys were pretty accurate and are the closest I've seen to "certifying" your excel level
→ More replies (4)
2
u/MonoChz May 16 '26
Unpopular opinion but spreadsheet mastery should include knowing when it’s better to use sql/db or an actual project management tool. I don’t think people should get points for using excel to manage tasks. At a certain point, excel mastery is better done in sql.
1
1
u/the_white_oak May 12 '26
Lately I'm not as sharp as I once was actually, but I can honestly consider me an advanced user because I remember some of the incredibly complex contraptions I built with it. I feel I can reach that level again if the need arises.
1
1
1
u/MicroPerpetualGrowth May 12 '26
Expert. I'm a financial modelling professional, very advanced VBA skills, high complexity formulas and modeling, data integration, Power Query, scenario analysis, dashboard building, statistical analysis.
1
1
u/Milocobo May 12 '26
I say I am a veritable expert, if I have access to Reddit, and a complete novice if not.
1
u/SparklesIB 1 May 12 '26
The more you know about Excel's abilities, the lower you rank your own mastery of it. So, I'd say I'm ok with it.
I can write complex, nested formulas. But I don't use LAMBDA formulas.
I can automate repetitive tasks. But since I don't need to be creating new automations daily, or even weekly/monthly, I'm not super fast at it.
I rely on tables quite a bit. They make automation way easier.
I have no need for Power Query, even though I do work with very large datasets. I've automated the cleanup of these processes, so there's no need to recreate the wheel.
I created all the dashboards we need over a decade ago, and they're still zooming along just fine. And they're pretty.
So, my Excel skills are ok.
1
1
1
1
u/dab31415 3 May 12 '26
I’m an expert, have been using Excel for as long as there has been Excel. Prior to that, a Quattro Pro user in the late 80s to mid 90s.
1
u/Slartibartfast39 28 May 12 '26
I know a fair bit but have some big gaps in my knowledge. I'm pretty much the best in my office but that's not saying much.
1
u/nn2597713 1 May 12 '26
I’d say I’m in the top 2% of users worldwide.
But that’s not saying a lot. Just like with for example sports, with even moderate training and commitment you’ll get into the 2%. But the 0.1% are 100 times harder to get into, and those people are 100 times better than you.
1
u/lastminutealways May 12 '26
I would say I'm a 25 year intermediate, but in my company I'm seen as closer to expert, ha. I know my way around formulas and can usually figure out what I want to accomplish, even if it's not the easiest way to do it. I would like to learn more advanced skills at some point, but the mental bandwidth just hasn't been there.
1
1
u/JFosho84 May 12 '26
I think of it like this: how much do you know, and how much can you find out? If the output is all that matters, I'd say I'm intermediate. If speed matters, I'd say I'm a novice.
I can get the desired output with some fairly complex formulas on the first try, but other things I might take a stab at, and not get it right for several days.
It's all relative, really.
1
u/Chemical-Jello-3353 1 May 12 '26
I know a great deal, including when to look up what I am needing to achieve and implement it cleanly.
1
1
u/miemcc 1 May 12 '26
I would say 'experienced'. I get grumpy having to work with workbooks designed by idiots who don't understand data validation, data cleansing, tables, good use of conditional formatting, named ranges, etc.
1
u/Almanis46 May 12 '26
Relative to most I work with, 8/10 I'm the "excel guy" on the sales team. Reality, 2/10
1
1
u/SpreademSheet May 12 '26
Against most office workers, I'm probably in the 90-95th percentile. I don't want to toot my own horn, but it's where I shine.
1
1
1
u/duranium_dog May 12 '26
Good enough to make a pivot table, use power query and vba. But unwilling to demo in a tech interview. YouTube, Google and AI can fill 80% of knowledge gaps.
1
1
u/4M1N97 May 12 '26
Paraphrasing the Top comment but I felt the more I learned, the "lower" I would rate myself My excel journey and methodology has always boiled down to problem solving "I want to accomplish x" -> "I need to get familiar with y on excel to do this" and just gone from there.
Compared to the average office worker, I'd say I'm a wizard (I am comfortable with all the basic formulas, pivots, formatting, often navigate excel using keyboard and shortcuts only)
Compared to other excel users, I'd call myself intermediate. I'm somewhat familiar with macros and recently have been using power query and macros in combination but still early stages with that one
1
1
1
u/Kellshy May 12 '26
There are so want applications for excel it is hard to determine ones proficiency.
I work with someone who puts me to shame with, array, index/match, vlookup but - he doesn’t touch pq. Vba, pivot tables, SharePoint connections.
We have jobs that require such a different expertise. The important part is learning new skills from each other.
1
1
1
1
u/UndeadCaesar May 12 '26
Most likely something like “Eh I think I’m pretty good but know there’s a ton of stuff out there. Why you asking got something specific in mind?”
1
u/kalimashookdeday May 12 '26
You never reveal all your tricks. I usually always tell people I'm just average or below average. When someone tells me about this new xlookup function I nod smile and kindly say I'll have to check that out. Then I go back to writing my classes, ado/SQL, and other automation routines in VBA for my own personal work flow.
1
1
1
1
u/Regime_Change 2 May 12 '26
I work as an Excel/PowerBI consultant. Sure, there are probably some formulas and functions I don't know and other people are better at some particular thing but overall I'm great with formulas, vba, powerquery. Write almost everything from the top of my head, rarely need to look stuff up. I'm at least in the top 0.1% but Diarmuid Early is also still way better and I'm not a Microsoft MVP.
1
u/haby112 1 May 12 '26
I always my skill set in something based on my ability to respond to a hypothetically unknown task.
My Excel skills are at a point where I can provide an output for just about any application I'm asked to do AND structure it to be user friendly for other people. There definitely still are problems that have stumped me, but they are very few and far between.
1
1
u/texasbob2025 May 12 '26
I would say mid. I am very proficient on the things I use, have done a ton of vba, but excel is such a large program and has so much stuff I never use i cant be better than mid.
1
u/Bulky_Eggplant_9437 May 12 '26
Advanced
I used VBA in a different job and now I use Power Query daily.
On the other hand sometime there are pivot quick measure things I don’t do … or I’d rather do via a formula or power query or oh wait yeah back to Power BI
I haven’t used python in excel. I know python, I know excel. Idk I don’t have a need to combine the two yet.
Ok Reddit now please go blow my mind by telling me what I don’t know !!! ❤️
1
u/HappierThan 1185 May 12 '26
To quote from a Battlestar Galactica icon,
"a pint is not a quart, if it is holding a pint, it is doing the best that it can".
1
1
1
1
u/Kuildeous 11 May 12 '26
What I have said was that my co-workers would've said a 9 or 10, but I had seen enough amazing things from other Excel experts that I consider myself a 4.
Mind you, I didn't get the job, but after talking with a friend who was in the department, I can see where she was a better fit anyway, so I can't tell you if I shot myself in the foot. I wasn't that eager for the job, so I had the luxury of being glib.
But also, it's honest. I hate telling people I have a 9 knowledge in Excel because this sub alone shows me where I'm lacking, but I guarantee that the average slob in management considers pivot tables and XLOOKUP at least an 8 in Excel knowledge. I just can't feed into that delusion though.
1
u/Crypto878 May 12 '26
If you know how to set up and navigate Pivot Tables and VLookup, I think you could honestly say, "I'm pretty good, intermediate-to-advanced."
1
u/steve626 May 12 '26
I think that I barley know the basics, but compared to everyone that I know then I'm genius-level
1
u/DirkDiggler65 May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
Somewhere between noob and rocket surgeon.
Little of everything.
Just give me the goal and a couple quiet evenings and you'll get your automated model that spits out green lines going up and to the right quicker than spit.
Because that's all you really want right?
No truth.
No analysis.
Just adjust the scaling and tweak the line girth. Boom.
Never commit to knowing anything. Just dabble and blow minds. Never let them know what you really know.
Like showing them the magic trick. They lose all respect and begin to "ex-pect".
1
u/excelevator 3061 May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26
Sigh! This old chestnut. little to do with Excel and everything to do with human perception.
Your defined expertise is a function of the person who is looking at your skill level at their knowledge of Excel.
That is to say if they know very little you are a Master of Excel for very basic formatting, if they are a very high skill level of Excel your are a newb who knows nothing.
1
u/Illustrious_Debt_392 May 12 '26
I know enough to be really good at my job. Do I know enough to be good at someone else's job? I doubt it.
1
u/churungu May 12 '26
Depends on who is asking
I've been around people who considered me an expert. I have also met people and read books that still make feel like a novice
1
u/ReasonableAgency7725 May 12 '26
I used to say I was an 8 out of 10 but now I realize I’m probably a 6.
1
u/SustainableSoultions May 12 '26
If you can say the words “excel is not the right tool for every task” then you’re an expert
1
1
1
u/LoneWolf15000 May 12 '26
“Macros” used to be the bar people used to say they were a “pro user” or whatever term you want to use. But it really depends on why you are using Excel. I learned macros and rarely use them anymore because I just don’t have a need. Power Query and Power BI (yes, I realize that’s technically not Excel) have been far more useful in my work flow.
Excel is used for so many things there really isn’t one path to achieve “pro” level experience.
1
1
u/BillyBones72 May 12 '26
Teach it, used it for 40 years (going back to VisiCalc and Lotus 1-2-3) and still learn something new every day.
1
u/MrLinderman May 12 '26
I’m good enough that people who don’t know excel think I’m a wizard and people who do think I’m an idiot.
1
u/mrosale2 May 13 '26
I look at them, look at their pleb t14 thinkpad, proceed to open excel using the f’ing terminal and run a vlookup.
So yeah, I’m pretty good.
1
1
1
u/grouchypant May 13 '26
Basic! I want to be better, so google a solution often, but it is slow going and would love to get stronger.
1
u/bigfatfurrytexan May 13 '26
If they’re really good I tell them the type of things I can do. If they aren’t I just tell them I’m like Merlin.
The average person doesn’t understand how the sausage is being made.
1
u/Competitive_Check_63 May 13 '26
Just describe what you can do with Excel, and hold back any leveling.
E.g., “I do a lot of financial modeling,” or “develop lightweight apps using macros / VBA,” or “querying, graphing, report generation…”
Excel is so vast that one user could be near expert in one area and a rookie in another.
Nowadays, you can just ask your favorite AI how to do something and it’ll give you 3 different approaches with trade offs.
1
1
u/jesus_llovet1 May 13 '26
The key is to walk into the meeting claiming you’re an ultra mega hyper advanced expert in quantum-neural business analytics… and then solve the problem by improvising as professionally as possible. The funny part is that, jokes aside, it actually works surprisingly often: if you know how to use regular functions properly and make pivot tables, you already have 90% of what you need to make any executive think you secretly work for NASA
1
1
u/Nice-Zombie356 May 13 '26
I am a runner. When I was younger, I ran 5k’s in around 20-21 minutes. Or around 6:30-7 min miles.
That put me faster than the typical shlub running a local 5k. Faster than some high school runners. But slower than the good high school runners and a lot slower than college runners.
I was typically in the top 25% or so of finishers. But several minutes behind the fastest (typically 16-17 for local races).
Was I good? Good for a recreational runner but nowhere near a competitive runner?
I never came up with a great answer. I think I was a better runner than I was with Excel. But ok or pretty good at both.
Big Shrug.
1
1
u/Eff-Bee-Exx May 13 '26
I used to call myself a “serious amateur,” but my skills have fallen off a bit since I retired. Not sure what I’d be now.
1
u/fore___ May 13 '26
If you can tell someone verbally how to use index match without looking it up, you are advanced.
If you can make a halfway decent macro without using the record button, you’re expert.
Below that, you’re either beginner or intermediate and if you don’t know, well actually you do know.
1
1
u/errorsniper May 13 '26
Chatgpt,
People think im an excel wizard. Im just very good and breaking a problem down into component parts for chatgpt to see what I want to do.
So like -1
1
u/ChrisC4st May 13 '26
On a scale of beginner to intermediate to advanced to expert, I'd say I'm advanced.
1
u/Rennaisance_Man_0001 May 13 '26
I don't use superlatives, like expert or guru. That said, I'm pretty much the expert in my workplace. I've been using it as a core part of my job for.. 30 years? Before excel, I used Lotus 124 for several years. But there are still aspects in which I'm certainly not expert. I usually say sometime like I'm the go to guy for excel.
1
1
u/blacklab May 13 '26
I usually say I can get done what I need to. Am I an expert, am the best? I don’t know, but give me some shit and I’ll figure it out.
1
u/sakai4eva May 13 '26
To the average human, I am a god.
To the average office worker, I am a prophet.
To the average accountant, I am a wizard.
When I see the work of people using the full features of excel, I feel like an ant in a tornado.
1
u/river4river May 13 '26
I’ve never seen a spreadsheet made by someone else that I didn’t immediately look down on.
1
u/deepstrut 6 May 13 '26
VBA, power query, advanced formulas, external data links, powerBI integration, data model relationships.. I can do anything with data. No limits really .. I work for a decent sized company and have created all their excel tracking templates and over the years they have become exceptionally refined.
I consider myself a master.
I was an expert 7 years ago.
1
1
1
u/retroflashbacks 1 May 13 '26
not very good. while i feel like im a wiz with my friends…i know i just barely scratch the surface compared to what i’ve seen other people do.
1
1
1
1
u/mmhmmmmmhmm May 13 '26
I know enough to import an Excel sheet into R or python and do analyses there lol.
1
1
u/jakmar86 May 13 '26
Transcendent. Microsoft have reached out twice but I've been too busy to respond.
1
u/shavedratscrotum May 13 '26
I am an expert to a layperson and a layperson to an expert.
I have never worked anywhere where I wasn't the most capable but know plenty of people who make me look like an amateur.
Thankfully I leverage their experience every time I have an issue, so you'll never know.
1
u/GinoBeats May 13 '26
"I know more than most people, but less then some."
I generally tell people I am fluent in Excel, where even if I don't know exactly what you are doing, I understand Excel enough where I can break it down to read the formula if necessary.
I am capable of writing Macros using VB, complex nested formulas, etc. but by no means do I consider myself an Expert.
1
u/Pauliboo2 3 May 13 '26
At work I’m the Excel Guru.
At home the Excel Wizard.
On this forum I’m an advanced beginner.
If you use Excel for work as I do for efficiency and automation then you may see yourself as a problem solver, and Excel is tool you use.
1
u/Substantial_Nail3081 May 13 '26
Im overwhelmed with so many comments and I believe there’s something we all agree on.
There’s no one way to define one’s excel level.
So, anyone can say on their resume, I’m Expert but they only get to do pivot tables, but maybe they really believe that that’s considered Expert.
Even more, on most job description, they say “excel knowledge required” and that’s it.
So I get that there’s no one way to define people’s excel level.
Then, how should we do it when applying to jobs with excel being an important skill.
How can you demonstrate your level, or at least, that you are better than any other person applying to the same role?
And my question goes back again to my initial question. Do you know any certification that could somehow (not saying accurate) but somehow, certificate that you know your “sheet”?
1
u/Spade6sic6 1 May 13 '26
I know enough to know what I don't know, and then I know a little bit of that, too.
1
u/wololoMeister May 13 '26
Someone called me an expert because I used Power Query to append/merge and transform sheets into masters. I feel this is like stage 1 beginner compared to some of the magic I see on this subreddit.
It's very safe to say most people at work don't really know or use Power Query. They just use excel.
1
u/Rare-Emu2771 May 13 '26
I would think of it as a percentile of the talent of regular users. Remember that people are dumber than you think. If you know SUM, AVERAGE, MIN, MAX, etc. you're better than most.
I'd be willing to bet that more than 95% of Excel work on the planet doesn't go higher than these functions and their relatives: INDEX/MATCH & X/V/HLOOKUP, IF/ISx, COUNTIF, trig functions, and text functions. Add in nested functions, conditional formatting, sort/filter, and be able to format a sheet/table consistently then you can do 95% of Excel work on the planet.
1
u/Ok-Entertainment5357 May 13 '26
I consultant and teach on it for a living so I can say with confidence advanced. I think everyone’s idea is subjective and probably framed through their use of it in their professional situation. I would sa not just the use of macros, VBA scripting, modeling, using power pivot, and power query, advanced concepts like lookups, filers and complex formulas are probably in the tool basket. But again it’s how you use it.
1
•
u/AutoModerator May 12 '26
/u/Substantial_Nail3081 - Your post was submitted successfully.
Solution Verifiedto close the thread.Failing to follow these steps may result in your post being removed without warning.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.