Best Excel Courses in 2026

Pick this for that goal

• You want to practise formulas from day one, for free: Coddy's Excel course. You type each formula into a live sheet in the browser and get it checked.
• You want a university name on the certificate: Coursera's Excel Skills for Business from Macquarie University. See our Coursera review.
• You want to become a data analyst: Google Data Analytics on Coursera, which teaches spreadsheets, SQL, Tableau and Python in one program.
• You want a short, guided first course: DataCamp's Introduction to Excel, about four hours. See our DataCamp review.
• You learn best by watching a teacher: Udemy's Excel from Beginner to Advanced, or a LinkedIn Learning course on the one topic you need. See our Udemy review.
• You want free lessons you can read at your own pace: Excel Easy or LearnFree.

The best free Excel courses

Free is a real option for Excel. The skills are well defined, the functions do not change often, and several free courses are good enough to get you to everyday competence. What you give up is usually the credential, not the knowledge.

• Coddy - an interactive Excel course where you work in a real spreadsheet in your browser, with no Excel licence or download needed. It suits beginners and anyone who wants to practise formulas, lookups and summarising data; the catch is that it is a fundamentals-to-analysis course, not a deep specialty program.
• Excel Easy - a free, illustrated tutorial site organised into chapters on the basics, functions, data analysis (sorting, filtering, charts, pivot tables, Solver) and VBA, plus about 300 worked examples. It suits people who like to read and look things up; it is text, so you practise in your own copy of Excel. Its site offers an Excel Easy certificate for completing all 49 chapters and shows no price for it.
• LearnFree - free self-paced Excel lessons, including a course called Excel: Foundations. It suits a calm, step-by-step start; the catch is that no certificate is listed on its pages.

The best paid Excel courses

Paid courses make sense when you want structure, a teacher, or a certificate that carries a recognised name. They differ most in how they charge: a subscription, a one-time course price, or a bundle.

• Coursera: Excel Skills for Business (Macquarie University) - four courses (Essentials, Intermediate I, Intermediate II and Advanced) of roughly 25 to 28 hours each, about three months at 10 hours a week. It suits learners who want a university certificate; the catch is that you need a paid plan for the certificate and it is mostly video.
• Google Data Analytics Professional Certificate (Coursera) - about six months at roughly 10 hours a week, covering spreadsheets, SQL, Tableau and Python. It costs around $49 per month in the US and Canada after a 7-day trial; it suits career changers, but Excel is only one part of it.
• DataCamp: Introduction to Excel - about four hours of short videos and 36 interactive exercises, practised in your own installed Excel. The first chapter of every course is free, so you can try it; the certificate and the full catalogue need Premium, listed at around $14 per month billed annually.
• Udemy: Microsoft Excel from Beginner to Advanced - a long video course taught by Kyle Pew, with a completion certificate. Udemy sells each course once, often on sale; we could not read its current price or hours on the page, so check them there. Quality varies by instructor, so read the recent reviews.
• LinkedIn Learning - a large library of short Excel courses, such as Excel Essential Training with Leila Gharani and separate courses on PivotTables and on VLOOKUP and XLOOKUP. It is a subscription, reported at around $40 a month, or around $20 a month billed yearly, usually after a one-month free trial. We could not confirm those amounts on its own page, so check before you subscribe.

Excel courses by level

Match the course to where you are now. Most people overspend by buying an advanced course before the basics are automatic.

• Basics (cells, ranges, SUM and AVERAGE): Excel Easy, LearnFree or the first lessons of Coddy's Excel course. You do not need to pay at this level.
• Formulas and functions (IF, COUNTIF and SUMIF, text functions, VLOOKUP and XLOOKUP): this is where hands-on practice matters most. Coddy's course covers these, and the Excel cheat sheet is a quick reference while you work. Coursera's Intermediate courses go deeper on the video side.
• Pivot tables and summaries: Excel Easy's data analysis chapters, LinkedIn Learning's PivotTables course, or Coursera's IBM course Excel for Data Analysis, which includes a pivot table module.
• Data analysis and dashboards: Coursera's Advanced course in the Macquarie specialization, or Google Data Analytics if you also want SQL and a path toward a data analyst role. Free courses rarely go this far.

You can also try formulas right now in the Excel playground before choosing a course.

Certificates and LinkedIn

Certificates vary a lot here. Coursera certificates for Excel Skills for Business and Google Data Analytics are paid and carry the brand of Macquarie University or Google, and can be added to LinkedIn. DataCamp gives a statement of accomplishment on its paid plans. Udemy and LinkedIn Learning give completion certificates, which show you finished but carry little weight on their own. Excel Easy offers one for finishing all 49 of its chapters, and LearnFree lists none.

A certificate shows you finished a course, not that you can do the job. Employers who care about Excel often test it directly, so the best proof is still being able to build the formula in front of them. Coddy also issues certificates, and they are 100% free: each is publicly verifiable and comes with a one-click "Add to LinkedIn profile" button, so you can see how the Excel certification works before you start.

The honest trade-off: a Macquarie University or Google certificate carries more name recognition than any free one, but it costs money and still does not replace showing you can use Excel. A free, verifiable Coddy certificate proves you did the hands-on work and adds to LinkedIn in one click.

How we picked

We chose courses a knowledgeable person would expect to see, and we looked for variety: a university course, a data career program, an interactive platform, a video course, a video library and two free written courses. We weighed cost, whether you practise or only watch, how far the course goes, and whether the certificate means something.

Prices and course details were checked on each provider's own page in November 2026. Prices change, so confirm before paying. Amounts marked "around" could not be confirmed there, and where a page did not show a price or trial we say so. We did not take every course, and this page is a guide to what each provider says and how it teaches, not a test of every lesson.

Which Excel course is best for you?

If you are a complete beginner on a budget, start with Coddy, Excel Easy or LearnFree. All three are free to begin, and Coddy adds a live sheet and a free certificate.

If you want a university certificate for your CV, pay for Coursera's Excel Skills for Business, and read our Coursera review first.

If you want to move into data work, Google Data Analytics is built for that. Use a free course first if you are not sure Excel is for you.

If you like video teachers, try Udemy or LinkedIn Learning. A single course on the topic you need beats a full library you never open.

Many learners combine two: a free hands-on course to build habits, then one paid course for depth or the certificate.