If SQL is the analyst’s power tool, Excel is the everyday screwdriver — still the most-used analytics surface in the world. Master the right subset and you can solve 80% of the daily problems in 20% of the time.
The must-know features
Pivot tables, INDEX/MATCH (or XLOOKUP), conditional formatting, and Power Query. Those four will cover most of what you do in your first year.
The patterns worth memorizing
Long-form data tables, named ranges, version-controlled file names, and one-sheet-per-workflow discipline. The teams that adopt these patterns argue about formatting much less.
The features you can skip at first
VBA, complex macros, and array formulas. They are powerful but rarely the right first investment in 2026.
The bottom line
Get the four features above to muscle memory and the rest of Excel becomes a UX problem instead of a knowledge problem.
