Most Excel formulas work in Google Sheets — but some behave differently, and a few don't exist at all on one side.
The vast majority of commonly-used formulas work exactly the same way in both Excel and Google Sheets — same syntax, same arguments, same results.
| Formula | Works identically in both |
|---|---|
| SUM, AVERAGE, MIN, MAX, COUNT, COUNTA | ✓ Identical |
| IF, IFS, IFERROR, IFNA | ✓ Identical |
| VLOOKUP, HLOOKUP | ✓ Identical |
| INDEX, MATCH | ✓ Identical |
| SUMIF, SUMIFS, COUNTIF, COUNTIFS | ✓ Identical |
| LEFT, RIGHT, MID, LEN, TRIM, UPPER, LOWER | ✓ Identical |
| TODAY, NOW, DATE, YEAR, MONTH, DAY | ✓ Identical |
| ROUND, ROUNDUP, ROUNDDOWN | ✓ Identical |
| AND, OR, NOT | ✓ Identical |
This covers roughly 80% of what most people use Excel or Sheets for. If you learn these formulas in either tool, they transfer directly.
| Formula | Excel | Google Sheets |
|---|---|---|
| XLOOKUP | ✓ Full support | ✓ Available but fewer options |
| FILTER | ✓ Full support | ✓ Works, slightly different syntax for empty result |
| UNIQUE | ✓ Full support | ✓ Works identically |
| SORT / SORTBY | ✓ Full support | SORT works, SORTBY not available |
| REGEXMATCH | ✗ Not available | ✓ Full support |
| QUERY | ✗ Not available | ✓ Unique to Sheets |
Learn Excel formulas — they transfer to Google Sheets for everything that matters. The core formulas (IF, VLOOKUP/XLOOKUP, SUMIFS, INDEX MATCH, text functions, date functions) are identical in both. The differences are at the edges — advanced array functions and platform-specific features. If your job uses Excel, learn Excel. If it uses Sheets, the formulas you learn here still apply to roughly 90% of what you'll do there.
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