10 Best Excel Alternatives for Project Management and Spreadsheets
Despite project management and spreadsheet programs getting better by nearly every conceivable standard, Microsoft Excel is still a popular choice of many. In this post, we will review some of the best Microsoft Excel alternatives.
Whether this popularity is owed to a simple spreadsheet platform with maximum customization, or that it lets you quickly process data, Excel is an essential tool in many workplaces.
But the mere infamy of the tool can’t mask the reality that for advanced functionality revolving around different kinds of datasets, you will need a powerful Excel alternative.
Particularly if you’re using the tool for project management, then you don’t know what you’ve gotten yourself into, my dear friend! We’ve got proof to validate this.
The reasons mentioned in the above proof should be motivation enough for you to switch to an alternative to Excel. If you don’t know where to start, or how to switch, don’t worry!
Also Read:
5 Reasons Why Excel Project Management Is Costing You More
We’ve compiled for you a great list of Excel alternatives. And to make things even better, we categorized them and spreadsheet functionality.
Let’s start.
The Best Excel Alternatives for Project Management
Microsoft Excel comes with pre-built project templates to help you get started, but other critical project management features, like time tracking and collaboration, are missing from the platform. Therefore, we’re starting off the list with Excel alternatives you need for project management:
1. UDN Task Manager
UDN Task Manager grabs #1 position in this compilation.
The tool makes an impression by coming up with features that normally you would get access to through third-party application integrations. An all-rounder when it comes to handling projects, UDN Task Manager makes a pretty solid alternative to Excel.
UDN Task Manager makes project management easier for you by allowing you to store, process, organize and collaborate – all through one platform.
The core functionalities associated with task management , time tracking , and project reporting can be experienced through a clean user-interface intelligently designed to bring maximum user ease.
⭐ Top Features
💸 Pricing
You can experience all the above-mentioned features and many more for Free and through Pro plan of the tool starting at $3 per user/month. Got a large team? UDN Task Manager also caters enterprises through the customizable Enterprise plan.
2. Jira
Next to Microsoft Excel alternative we have is Jira. A powerful tool quite popular with software teams, Jira provides workflow mapping for projects, along with multiple other Agile development functionalities for releasing the software effectively.
The tool makes sure things are done right from the beginning by providing an array of features to plan, track, and report efficiently.
To track your project performance in real-time, you can get access to a vast library of Agile reports ranging from basic burndown and burnup charts to more advanced sprint reports and velocity charts, etc.
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3. Smartsheet
Smartsheet provides project management solutions to teams through a spreadsheet-like interface.
The software comes with a dynamic mix of tools providing a range of features like resource management, document management, pre-built project templates, and team portals.
Being a spreadsheet program at heart, Smartsheet passes as a pretty solid Excel alternative, but with some enhanced project tracking functions and greater customization options.
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Also See:
Top 14 Microsoft Project Alternatives of 2022
4. Airtable
Airtable is a cloud-based project management software that combines the functionality of a spreadsheet and database to provide the most user-friendly experience while managing projects.
It’s a free Excel alternatives, the tool comes with a pleasing design and easy interface to help users have fun while getting things done.
Facilitating multiple views for data visualization, Airtable lets you organize your work the way you want. You can also create multiple databases in one location for quick and easy access.
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The Best Excel Alternatives for Spreadsheets
It wouldn’t be fair on our part if we didn’t include alternatives for Excel spreadsheets, because a lot of you rely on spreadsheets for your daily tasks’ management. Let’s start:
5. Google Sheets
An easy to manage alternatives to Excel, Google Sheets is quite similar to Excel when it comes to functionality and design. There are a few things that Excel lacks when compared with Google Sheets.
For starters, all your files are stored in the cloud which means you can access your data from any device and at any time you want.
An interesting feature of Google Sheets is that you can share them with anyone and work together simultaneously. You can even add comments and chat with your team members to collaborate instantly.
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6. LibreOffice
An open-source office suite, LibreOffice is a quite popular free Excel alternatives. Compatible with a wide range of document formats, the tool is an excellent exporter of data and provides maximum control to the user.
LibreOffice comes with 6 component programs that essentially make up the complete office suite. These components are Writer (word processing), Calc (spreadsheets), Impress (presentations), Draw (vector graphics), Math (formula editor), and Base (databases).
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7. Zoho Sheet
Another cloud-based spreadsheet program, Zoho Sheet grabs 7 position in our list of Microsoft Excel alternatives. The application provides real-time collaboration features, alongside essential spreadsheet functionality.
For ensuring maximum data security, Zoho Sheet provides you with an option to lock particular cells in a spreadsheet. Moreover, with version history feature, your data is backed up for you to access it anytime you want.
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Zoho Sheet is free.
See also:
The 8 Best Trello Alternatives for Kanban Project Management
8. Numbers
Stepping into the game of spreadsheet programs, Numbers is Apple’s version of Microsoft Excel and can work as a perfect Excel alternatives. Numbers provides high-quality data visualization tools and reporting functionality to users. The application comes with pre-built templates, numerous customizable shapes, and donut charts to help you convert your data into beautiful presentations.
Spreadsheets can be easily shared and edited by anyone to make sure they don’t miss any update.
What’s even more interesting about Numbers is that even if someone prefers to work on Excel, you can save Numbers spreadsheet as Excel spreadsheet and continue to work (talk about sportsman spirit, eh?).
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9. Bime
Bime is one of those Excel alternatives that can help you visualize data with making any efforts. You can easily present the data, analyze and visualize the reports on Bime dashboard.
With the Bime Analytics tool, you can get the information from different sources to create customized reports, metrics and generate dashboards. However, it cannot deliver all the Microsoft Excel functions and feature sets, but still, you can save your time in making visually appealing data reports with charts and graphs.
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10. Apache OpenOffice
One of the best Excel alternatives that you can find right now in the market is Apache OpenOffice. It is a free and open-source suite of different tools and software that assist different businesses, professionals, and companies in their daily activities.
These activities include writing different projects, streamlining their document management tasks and processes, and also manipulating or changing valuable data and information regarding the company and its projects.
The software also allows you to transfer data and information between the different tools included in a unique feature-set. It also provides spreadsheet applications that have the power to pool different data from various sources all at the same time.
Some of the most interesting features that this amazing tool has to offer are described below.
