is there an ai for excel?

If you want AI inside Excel itself

Microsoft Copilot in Excel is built into the Excel desktop app on Microsoft 365 Personal, Family and Premium, so you work on the files you already have, with no separate tool. Personal is £8.49 per month or £84.99 per year on Microsoft's UK page, and each plan offers a one-month free trial. It runs on Windows and Mac.

What you give up is a free option, because Microsoft's UK page lists no free plan for Copilot in Excel. You also give up some freedom over where files live. Microsoft says it needs AutoSave on, which means the file must be saved to OneDrive, and it does not work with unsaved files. If your spreadsheets live on a local drive, that is a real cost.

If you work in Google Sheets

Gemini in Google Sheets is Google's AI inside Sheets. Google says it can create trackers, tables and visualisations from prompts, create formulas and analyse data by detecting patterns. You ask in plain English, which suits you if Sheets is already where you work.

If slides are the other half of your day, the same idea runs the other way, with a prompt turning into a finished deck. I've put together a guide to AI presentation tools that says which ones export PowerPoint files, including one that does it on a free plan. It also covers four more that can start a deck from a prompt, so you can compare them before you pick.

The catch is that it is Google Sheets, not Excel, and the pricing is unclear. Google's UK subscriptions page lists Gemini in Gmail, Docs, Vids and more for Google AI Pro (£18.99 per month) and Gmail, Vids and more for Google AI Plus (£4.49 per month), but neither names Sheets. On Google Workspace for business, the pricing page marks Gemini in Sheets as not supported on the Business Starter plan. We could not verify which personal plan includes it, or whether the free Google account does.

If you want it free for the odd formula

GPTExcel is an AI spreadsheet assistant: you upload an Excel or CSV file, ask in plain English, and get formulas, pivot tables, charts and summaries. Its $0 forever plan includes the formula, script, SQL, regex and template generators and the pivot table builder, limited to 4 tool uses every 12 hours. It also offers a Pivot Builder agent for pivot tables, slicers and pivot charts.

The free plan is tight. You get 10 AI chat messages every 30 days and files up to 5 MB, and prices are in US dollars. Pro at $9 per month gives 3,000 messages and 50 MB files, and Pro Plus is $18 per month. The pricing page says annual billing saves 30%.

If you want dashboards and reports, not just formulas

Better Analyst, formerly Formula Bot, is an AI analytics app. It connects Excel, Google Sheets, OneDrive and databases, builds dashboards and reports, and exports spreadsheets to Excel. That is a different job from writing a single formula.

It is a separate web app, not an add-in inside Excel, so you work outside your spreadsheet. The page says there is a free forever plan and no credit card is required, but it does not state the free allowance. Paid plans start at $20 per month for Starter, with Max at $40 per user per month and Business at $80 per user per month, all in US dollars.

When paying is worth it

If you live in Excel, Microsoft 365 Personal at £8.49 per month (£84.99 per year) gets you Excel with Copilot. Family is £10.49 per month. Premium at £18.99 per month adds extensive Copilot usage and agentic features; Microsoft says those include advanced research and analytics. If you only need the occasional formula, the free plans at GPTExcel and Better Analyst let you see whether an AI helps before you pay for anything.

On Microsoft 365 Family, Microsoft says AI features are for the subscription owner only, not the other people sharing the plan. If you expect everyone in the household to get Copilot, they will not.

Better Analyst advertises a lower first month, $10 for Starter, after which the price is $20 per month. Check the renewal price, not the first-month price.

Think about where your data goes. GPTExcel and Better Analyst work on files you upload to them, so your data goes to that company. Copilot in Excel works on files saved to OneDrive, which is Microsoft's own cloud storage, so your data sits with Microsoft instead. If a spreadsheet holds anything sensitive, check which company you are comfortable holding it.