European Alternatives to Microsoft Excel

Collabora Online Logo

Collabora Online

United Kingdom
Open Source
Self-Hostable

Collabora Online is a powerful and flexible online office suite designed for collaborating on documents, spreadsheets, and presentations in real-time. It supports a variety of document formats and integrates seamlessly into existing...

CryptPad Logo

CryptPad

France
EU
Open Source

CryptPad is a versatile and secure collaborative platform that prioritizes user privacy. Designed for individuals and teams seeking to work together without compromising data security, it provides a suite of productivity tools...

Infomaniak kSuite Logo

Infomaniak kSuite

Switzerland

kSuite is an innovative suite of tools offered by Infomaniak, designed to enhance productivity and collaboration for businesses and individuals alike. With a strong emphasis on privacy and data protection, kSuite provides...

LibreOffice Logo

LibreOffice

Germany
EU
Open Source
Self-Hostable

LibreOffice is a powerful open-source office suite that offers a wide range of tools for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, and more. Developed by The Document Foundation, it is available for multiple...

MobiOffice Logo

MobiOffice

Bulgaria
EU

MobiOffice is a versatile mobile office application designed to enhance productivity for users on the go. With a robust feature set, it caters to individuals and teams that require access to documents...

Nextcloud Office Logo

Nextcloud Office

Germany
EU
Open Source
Self-Hostable

Nextcloud Office is a powerful, collaborative office suite that integrates seamlessly with Nextcloud, an open-source cloud storage solution. It offers a rich set of features for document editing and collaboration, catering to...

ONLYOFFICE Logo

ONLYOFFICE

Latvia
EU
Open Source
Self-Hostable
Non-European Parent Company

ONLYOFFICE is a powerful online office suite that provides productivity tools for document management, collaboration, and project management. Designed to enhance efficiency and streamline workflows, ONLYOFFICE offers a user-friendly interface and a...

Softmaker Office Logo

Softmaker Office

Germany
EU

SoftMaker Office is a versatile and powerful office suite designed for users who seek an alternative to traditional software like Microsoft Office. This European-developed software provides a comprehensive solution for word processing,...

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European alternatives to Microsoft Excel are spreadsheet programs that open and save .xlsx files. The directory lists LibreOffice Calc and PlanMaker from SoftMaker Office (both Germany), the ONLYOFFICE spreadsheet editor (Latvia) and the browser-based editors in Collabora Online (UK), Nextcloud Office (Germany), CryptPad (France), Infomaniak kSuite (Switzerland) and MobiOffice (Bulgaria). Excel is the spreadsheet application of Microsoft in the USA. This page is only about spreadsheets; the whole suite is covered under European alternatives to Microsoft Office.

Why people look for an Excel alternative

Excel is usually bought as part of a Microsoft 365 subscription, and files often end up in a US cloud. Teams that want a one-off licence, a free program, an own server or a European provider look at the tools below instead.

Which spreadsheet fits which job

NeedWhere to look
Free desktop programLibreOffice with Calc, open source
Desktop program with .xlsx as native formatSoftMaker Office with PlanMaker, which lists dynamic arrays and XLOOKUP
Browser-based editing on your own serverONLYOFFICE, Collabora Online, Nextcloud Office
End-to-end encrypted sheetsCryptPad, whose Sheet app integrates the ONLYOFFICE editor
Swiss cloud with office editorsInfomaniak kSuite
Mobile and Windows appsMobiOffice

Compatibility with .xlsx and macros

Plain tables, formulas and charts usually transfer well, while pivot tables, conditional formatting and very large workbooks need a test. Macros are the main hurdle. LibreOffice supports VBA only in part, according to its help, so macros often have to be rewritten in LibreOffice Basic. PlanMaker offers BasicMaker for VBA-like macros on Windows, and ONLYOFFICE uses JavaScript macros. Excel-specific features such as Power Query or Office add-ins have no direct equivalent in most of these tools.

Switching checklist

  1. List the formulas, macros and add-ins that are really used.
  2. Open copies of the most important workbooks in the new program and compare the results.
  3. Keep .xlsx as the exchange format with customers and colleagues who still use Excel.