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Comparison of Excel 2003 & Excel 2007
Is Excel 2007 Right for Me?
Comparison Chart: Features Usability | Home User | Business/Business User
| Features |
Excel 2003 |
Excel 2007 |
| Rows |
65,636 |
1,048,576 |
| Columns |
256 |
16,384 |
| Workbook Size |
Limited to 16 FULL Worksheets in any one Workbook, or instnace of Excel. |
Limited only by available memory. |
| Header/Footer |
Basic and limited. |
Allows color formatting to text in Headers and Footers. Also allows you to display different headers and footers on even and odd pages as well as the first page. |
| Formatting Cells |
512 global font types available, 4,000 unique cell formats available, and basic cell formatting style options. |
1,024 global font types available, 64,000 unique cell formats available, and more advanced cell formatting and style options such as shadows. |
| Pivot Tables |
32,500 unique items per field allowed. Must format Pivot Tables manually. |
1,048,576 unique items per field allowed. Can quickly format Pivot Tables with preset Themes. |
| Sorting |
Sort with up to three conditions. |
Sort with up to 64 conditions. Can sort by specific formats and not just text. |
| Cell Linking |
Limit of 65,472 workbook arrays refering to other worksheets. |
Limited only by available memory for the number of arrays refering to other worksheets. |
| Nesting Formulas |
7 levels of nesting - i.e. maximum of 7 nested IF statements. |
64 levels of nesting - i.e. maximum of 64 nested IF statements. |
| Formulas |
Formulas can contain up to 30 arguments. Formulas can contain 40 operands. |
Formulas can contain up to 255 arguments. Formulas can contain up to 1,024 operands. |
| Conditional Formatting |
Allows maximum of three conditions. |
Allows maximum of 64 conditions. Conditional formatting ranges in cells can overlap. Conditional formatting can continue after the condition has been met. Conditional formatting can be applied to non-adjacent ranges. |
| New Conditional Formatting Types - Excel 2007 |
N/A |
 Color Scales
Data bars
Icon sets
Top or bottom ranked values
Above or below average values
Unique or duplicate values
Table column comparison to determine which cells to format
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| Graphics |
Basic |
'Up-to-Date' Can create charts and graphics in much better form than excel 2003. |
| Customization |
Can customize the look and feel extensively and it is very easy to add your own toolbars and buttons. |
It is more difficult to customize Excel 2007 and you are not able to add custom buttons or toolbars to the new 'Ribbon' style interface, only a quick access toolbar. |
| Usability |
Excel 2003 |
Excel 2007 |
| Editing between versions |
Cannot edit all charts and tables and graphics from Excel 2007 unless those spreadsheets have been saved in the 97-2003 format in Excel 2007. |
Can edit formats from previous excel versions. Files must be saved in the 97-2003 format to make them fully editable in previous versions. |
| Interface |
Classic, easy to use and standard for many years. |
New 'Ribbon' style interface which is very confusing at first. Everything which was previously text based is now graphical. It will therefore eat up more memory to run but, in theory, shouldn't be too noticeable for most users. |
| Macros |
Easy to record and use whenever you want. |
More difficult to record some macros. Also, macros will not work in password protected workbooks. |
| Macro Buttons |
Very easy to customize and change. |
Very difficult to customize and change. |
| Large Files |
Will open quickly and handle relatively efficiently. |
Takes a long time to open large files. However, will run large numbers of formulas faster than in Excel 2003. |
| Stability |
Very stable; Tried and true. |
A number of issues have been reported with Excel 2007 not opening files, not saving files, and basically just going through the process of gradually improving due to it being a new program. |
Upgrade? - It depends, maybe
Buy Excel 2007 if:
- You do a lot with graphics, charts, and graphs and apearance is BIG factor
- You do a lot with Pivot Tables and you want improved implementation and data modeling capabilities.
- You use A LOT of data in Excel which would require you to need more than Excel 2003 allows for. Excel 2007 has 1,048,576 Rows and 16,384 Columns.
- You need improved data import abilities. i.e. Excel 2007 has preconfigured business sources from which to import data.
As a regular or home user you will probably not benefit a whole lot from upgrading. That said, it really depends on what you do with Excel. If you store large amounts of data and need more capacity (rows, columns, worksheets, etc.) in your files than Excel 2003 currently provides, upgrading would be a good option for you. Additionally, if you value 'cool' looking graphs, charts, effects, etc. and they are integral to what you do, Excel 2007 is a good option. Really though, these main features, combined with the fact that you have the ability to have more complex formulas including having a larger nesting capability, more conditional formulas, and more formatting choices are the bulk of the benefit of upgrading.
Yes Excel 2007 has more capabilities than previous versions and yes it will allow you to do more, BUT for the regular home user of excel, there is no reason to upgrade, yet.
Unless you seriously require the new features that Excel 2007 offers, do not upgrade yet! Excell 2007 is great, but in terms of usability, it is very hard for someone who has been using Excel 2003 for years to work at the same level of efficiency in Excel 2007 as in Excel 2003 for at least a few weeks to a month or longer. Simply speaking, there is a big learning curve when upgrading. The 'Ribbon' style interface will throw most people off almost immediately and it will hurt productivity. That, in addition to the fact that Excel 2007 is not yet as stable as its predecessors, should signal that it is better to wait for a newer version of Excel to come out, when all the bugs have been fixed, and then think about upgrading.
When you or your business does inevitably make the transition from Excel 2003 to Excel 2007(or later) it is a good recommendation to install the newer version of Excel while still keeping the older version. This can be achieved simply by do doing a custom install and then opting to keep all previous version of Excel. This way, you will be able to slowly transition into the new Excel and learn how to do everything with a minimal loss of productivity.
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