In a previous post, we looked at XLOOKUP, which is the new and improved replacement for one of Excel’s most popular functions, VLOOKUP. In this article, we’re going to look at XMATCH, which (you’ve guessed it) is a replacement for the MATCH function. As you’ll see, XMATCH doesn’t enhance the old MATCH function particularly – …
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Johannes Åkesson
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How to Use XMATCH: Guide and Examples
Posted Aug 18th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Mastering Excel Data With | No Comments -
Excel Linked Data Types: An Introduction
Posted Aug 18th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Mastering Excel Data With | No CommentsThere’s a cool feature in Excel for Microsoft 365 that not many people know about. Linked Data Types allow you to access data from a range of subject areas such as finance, geography, nutrition, and media directly in Excel. Do you need to include the latest exchange rates, company stock prices, or city population figures …
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SQL Spreads release 6.2.8
Posted Aug 9th, 2022 By Johannes Åkesson in SQL Spreads, Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 6.2.8 is now available for download. Fixed issue with bigint numbers with more than 17 digits that were truncated. Fixed issue with commas in text key columns. Fixed issue with uninstalling when both the per-machine and the per-user versions was installed. Fixed issue with the database connection setting “Remember password on local machine”. …
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What is the equivalent to VLOOKUP in SQL?
Posted Jul 14th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in SQL Guides for Excel Users With | 9 CommentsIn this article, we’re going to show you how to perform the equivalent of Excel’s VLOOKUP in SQL. This is the second of our articles aimed at teaching Excel users the basics of SQL. In our previous article “Introduction to SQL for Excel Users”, we introduced the JOIN statement, and here we’re going to expand …
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Introduction to SQL for Excel Users
Posted Jul 4th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in SQL Guides for Excel Users With | 2 CommentsThis is the first of several articles on SQL for Excel users. The aim is to show you why it’s so useful for Excel users to be familiar with SQL and to introduce some basic concepts and queries. Why is it important to learn SQL? In a previous article, SQL and Excel: Why you need …
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Excel Power Query: What is it? Why use it?
Posted Jul 1st, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Mastering Excel Data With | No CommentsWith Excel Power Query you can connect to data sources, import data, clean and shape it and then load it into Excel or a data model so that you can create charts and reports. In this article, we’re going to look at some examples of where you’d use Power Query and give a quick overview …
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How to Use SQL with Excel for Data Analysis
Posted Jun 8th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in SQL Guides for Excel Users With | No CommentsIn a previous article, we talked about why most organizations should use both SQL Server and Excel for their data management needs. In this article, we’re going to look at an example of how to perform data analysis using SQL and Excel with an Excel Add-In, called SQL Spreads. You can use the Add-In to …
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SQL Spreads release 6.2.1
Posted May 23rd, 2022 By Johannes Åkesson in SQL Spreads, Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 6.2.1 is now available for download. Support for connecting to Azure SQL using Azure AD Authentication. Support for using Multi-Factor Authentication when authenticating to Azure AD. Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »
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How to Connect Power Apps to SQL Server
Posted May 13th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Master Data Management With | 4 CommentsIn this article, we’re going to look at how to connect Power Apps to SQL Server. This provides a slightly deeper dive than was covered in our previous Quick Start Guide to Power Apps. Power Apps is the low-code/no-code platform from Microsoft. It aims to make it quick and easy for people in organizations to …
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SQL Server Import and Export Wizard Guide
Posted May 6th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Connect Excel and SQL With | No CommentsThis guide explains how to use the SQL Server Import and Export Wizard to get data into a SQL Server database. What is the SQL Server Import and Export Wizard? SQL Server Import and Export Wizard is a simple way to copy data from a source to a destination. It is most commonly used to …
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Connect Excel to SQL Server: 3 Easy Steps
Posted May 6th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Connect Excel and SQL With | 2 CommentsIn a previous article, we spoke about why you need both Excel and SQL in your data management solutions, but how do you connect Excel to SQL Server? In this article, we’re going to show you the steps and highlight a key benefit of using an Excel add-in like SQL Spreads. But, first, we’re going …
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Export Power BI to Excel: Solved
Posted May 3rd, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Power BI and SQL Server With | 2 CommentsPower BI is a Business Intelligence (BI) platform. With Power BI, users can get data, analyze it, and create visualizations that help turn raw data into actionable information for their business. It’s normally the case that you want to import data from Excel to Power BI to create a dashboard or report, but there are …
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Power BI Fact and Dimension Tables
Posted Apr 1st, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Power BI and SQL Server With | No CommentsIn an earlier article, we looked at how to create a dashboard based on some sales data. The data source for that example was several tables in a SQL database. In this article, we’re going to look in more detail at the data model we built in that Power BI example, and specifically the use …
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SQL Spreads release 6.1.32
Posted Mar 29th, 2022 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 6.1.32 is now available for download. Improved deleting of rows in the database to align with Excel’s Delete rows. Added check if per-machine or per-user installer exists. Added a possibility to call Excel’s Refresh All command after data is saved to the database. Fixed bug so that commas can be used in Pivot …
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SQL and Excel: Why you need both
Posted Mar 12th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in SQL Guides for Excel Users With | 2 CommentsSQL vs. Excel: which is better? As you can see from the title of this article, it’s not the case that you should choose one over the other; you actually need SQL and Excel. Introduction Excel is a really great application. There are not many applications that are used by such a wide variety of …
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How to use XLOOKUP: Guide and Examples
Posted Mar 2nd, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Mastering Excel Data With | 1 CommentIf you’ve been using Excel for a while, you’ll undoubtedly have used one of its most useful functions – VLOOKUP. This lookup function is invaluable when manipulating data or preparing reports in Excel. If you’re already familiar with VLOOKUP, then you’ll love the new XLOOKUP function that Microsoft released in late 2019. It overcomes some …
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What is Power Apps? Quick Start Guide
Posted Feb 18th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Master Data Management With | No CommentsMore and more people are using no-code technologies to create mobile apps, and there are a growing number of vendors in this area. In this article, we’ll be focusing on Microsoft’s no-code platform, Power Apps. Because it’s a no-code platform it should be easy to create apps, right?! Well, yes, it is easy to use …
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Creating Reports with Power BI, SQL and Excel
Posted Feb 9th, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Power BI and SQL Server With | No CommentsIn an earlier post, we introduced Power BI and looked at what makes a good dashboard. In this article, we’re going to go through the steps for creating reports with Power BI, SQL, and Excel. How Does Power BI Work? A Brief Overview Power BI is a Business Intelligence (BI) platform. With Power BI, …
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CSV to SQL: How to Convert, Open & Import
Posted Jan 31st, 2022 By Andy McDonald in Connect Excel and SQL With | 1 CommentIn this article, we’re going to look at 3 ways to convert a CSV file to SQL. This is a common use case, so hopefully, you’ll find the following information useful in your day-to-day work. Introduction Comma Separated Values (CSV) files are commonly used to exchange data from one system or application to another. The …
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SQL Spreads release 6.1.15
Posted Dec 9th, 2021 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 6.1.15 is now available for download. Added support for the new pricing model with Basic, Pro and Premium plans and separate Editor licenses. Added a checkbox to the Table Creator to decide if columns in a new table should be nullable. Added a field to set the name of the Identity column in …
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Master Data Management: What is it and Why is it Important?
Posted Dec 2nd, 2021 By Andy McDonald in Master Data Management With | No CommentsMaster Data Management (MDM) is an information management discipline focusing on data quality and data governance. Its goal is to mitigate problems caused when Master Data is inconsistent, fragmented, or out of date. In this article, we’re going to explain what MDM is and provide some tips on how to start an MDM journey. What …
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SQL Spreads release 6.0.44
Posted Oct 29th, 2021 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 6.0.44 is now available for download. This new release focus on stability improvements – we have made a number of stability improvements and fixes in the areas around Excel table formatting, detection of changes in SQL Server etc. Added the possibility to set a Default value for a column to use when a …
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Simple Data Validation in SQL
Posted Oct 24th, 2021 By Andy McDonald in SQL Guides for Excel Users With | 1 CommentWhat is data validation in SQL and why is it important? Data validation is a method for checking the accuracy and quality of data. Information in databases is constantly being updated, deleted, queried, or moved by multiple people or processes, so ensuring that data is valid at all times is essential. In this article, we’re …
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How to create Pivot Tables in SQL Server
Posted Oct 10th, 2021 By Andy McDonald in SQL Guides for Excel Users With | No CommentsIn this article, we’re going to show you how to create pivot tables in SQL Server. This is the third article aimed at teaching Excel users some basic SQL server queries, and how to mimic some of the main functions used in Excel. In a previous article we looked at the equivalent of Excel’s VLOOKUP …
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SQL Spreads release 6.0.30
Posted Jun 17th, 2021 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 6.0.30 is now available for download. This new release introduce a new feature to use the Tree filter selection as the key column when inserting new rows into a table. Added a new Parameter selection dialog to easily insert Tree Filter and Cell parameters. Added the possibility to remove key columns that are …
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SQL Spreads release 6.0.17
Posted Mar 30th, 2021 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 6.0.17 is now available for download. SQL Spreads 6.0 introduces the new Lookup feature to easily lookup key values from a related table or a list of fixed key-text pairs. A drop-down list in Excel allows the user to select a text item, while the corresponding key will be written to the database. …
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SQL Spreads release 5.1.12
Posted Sep 30th, 2020 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 5.1.12 is now available for download. Added support for using key columns with the UNIQUE IDENTIFIER data type while also generating new IDs as a default value in SQL Server. Fixed issue with Designer being locked for new worksheets in certain cases. Minor bug fixes Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »
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SQL Spreads release 5.1.07
Posted Jul 1st, 2020 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 5.1.07 is now available for download. The Excel table is now always resized to the number rows that are imported from the database. Added support for using SQL Server columns with the data type DateTimeOffset. Conflict detection will now work over different time zones when setting the ModifiedOn Change Tracking column to a …
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What’s new in SQL Spreads 5.0?
Posted May 7th, 2020 By Johannes Åkesson in SQL Spreads With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 5.0 is the largest update in over two years, with several new and exciting improvements. We have implemented a couple of long-anticipated features, such as: We have also implemented several changes to improve how you can develop and deploy SQL Spreads documents: To try SQL Spreads 5.0, you can download the 14-day free …
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SQL Spreads release 5.0.55
Posted Apr 29th, 2020 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 5.0.55 is now available for download. SQL Spreads 5.0 is the largest SQL Spreads update in over two years with several long-wished features and improvements such as data pivoting, the table creator and database, and table search. Introducing the new Pivoting feature to update pivoted data in columns in Excel into rows in …
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SQL Spreads release 4.50.148
Posted Dec 2nd, 2019 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.50.148 is now available for download. Fixed issue with changing the SQL Server server name (the text field was disabled) when opening a document when the SQL Server instance is not accessible. Fixed issue with conflict detection not saving non-conflicting rows correctly. Fixed issue with checking the license on the server if a …
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SQL Spreads release 4.50.139
Posted Oct 31st, 2019 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.50.139 is now available for download. With this release, we are introducing a new license system that supports online activations and a lot of new features on the deployment and installation side. With the new online activations, there is no need to manually activate the licenses through emails. If you are an existing …
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SQL Spreads release 4.4.7
Posted Jun 5th, 2019 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.4.7 is now available for download. Fixed issue when working with protected Excel worksheets. Fixed issue with conflict detection giving an error under certain circumstances. Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »
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SQL Spreads release 4.4.5
Posted Apr 16th, 2019 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.4.5 is now available for download. Fixed issue with “Remember password on this machine” for Data User installations. Fixed issue with license key being lost when upgrading SQL Spreads – the fix resolves the issue for upgrades from 4.4.5 and forward on. Fixed issue with loading data when using Excel tables with table …
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SQL Spreads release 4.4.3
Posted Mar 6th, 2019 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.4.3 is now available for download. Added a new MSI-installer property to make it possible to force an overwrite of the license key during installation. Resolved issue with mapping columns to CreatedOn and CreatedBy in the Advanced Setup. Resolved issue with the progress panel not hiding after saving data to the database for …
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What’s new in SQL Spreads 4.4?
Posted Feb 1st, 2019 By Johannes Åkesson in SQL Spreads With | No CommentsWe are proud to announce the release 4.4 of SQL Spreads – the solution for easily letting your non-technical people manage and update data in SQL Server using Excel. In this article, we will shortly describe what’s new in this release. A complete list of the changes in SQL Spreads release 4.4 can be found …
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SQL Spreads release 4.4.0
Posted Jan 31st, 2019 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.4.0 is now available for download. Added new buttons to the SQL Spreads tab in Excel for saving and refreshing the data between Excel and SQL Server. Added new change tracking setting to separately track database row creation with date, time and Windows user name. Added a release license feature for transferring a …
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Happy Holidays from the SQL Spreads team
Posted Dec 18th, 2018 By Johannes Åkesson in SQL Spreads With | No CommentsThis year has been a successful year for SQL Spreads thanks to our fantastic customer and partners. There are now more than 200 customers in over 30 countries that use SQL Spreads to simplify for their non-technical users to update and manage their important data stored in Microsoft SQL Server. We would like to thank …
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SQL Spreads release 4.3.1
Posted Nov 1st, 2018 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.3.1 is now available for download. Fixed issue connecting to Azure SQL databases when opening an older SQL Spreads document. Fixed issue when creating a new Database Import. Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »
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SQL Spreads release 4.3.0
Posted Oct 25th, 2018 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.3.0 is now available for download. This release adds a few new features and also improves working with data in Azure SQL. Added support for working with contained databases, where the default database must be specified. Added the Formula Row feature to be able to add summary rows within an Excel range that …
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SQL Spreads release 4.2.5
Posted May 8th, 2018 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.2.5 is now available for download. Fixed issue with working with SQL Spreads when the Excel document is in Read-Only mode. Fix issue with cursor not returning from wait state after loading document. Minor other fixes and stability improvements. Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »
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SQL Spreads release 4.2.4
Posted Jan 26th, 2018 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.2.4 is now available for download. Added possibility to auto-save the Excel file after data has been saved to the database. Added support for XML data type columns. Added warning of FIPS encryption is enabled. Fixed issue with loading SQL Spreads document when opening a document without having Excel running. Fixed issue with …
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SQL Spreads release 4.2.2
Posted Sep 12th, 2017 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.2.2 is now available for download. Fixed issue with columns not shown for table names with Cyrillic characters. Fixed issue with ordering of the databases in the Designer. Minor bug fixes and improvements. Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »
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SQL Spreads release 4.2.0
Posted Jul 7th, 2017 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsWith this new release, SQL Spreads has support for updating and managing data in cloud-based Azure SQL databases.
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SQL Spreads release 4.1.7
Posted Apr 6th, 2017 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.1.7 is now available for download. Added new setting to scroll to the first row after data has been refreshed. Added new info panel when the Designer’s preview mode is turned on. The info panel will be shown below the last loaded data row and inform the user that preview mode is turned …
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SQL Spreads release 4.1.4
Posted Feb 17th, 2017 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.1.4 is now available for download. Improved license key handling. Added the possibility to force an update of columns that saves the result of an Excel formula to the database. Bug fixes and minor updates. Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »
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SQL Spreads release 4.1.3
Posted Dec 5th, 2016 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.1.3 is now available for download. Fixed issue with case sensitive collation. Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »
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SQL Spreads release 4.1.2
Posted Dec 2nd, 2016 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.1.2 is now available for download. Bug fixes and minor updates. Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »
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SQL Spreads release 4.1.1
Posted Nov 17th, 2016 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | 1 CommentSQL Spreads 4.1.1 is now available for download. The major improvement in this release is support for updating data in SQL Server Views from Excel. The new View support also includes updating data in Views that joins data from multiple base tables. Added support for updating data in SQL Server Views. Added automatic detection of …
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SQL Spreads release 4.0.27
Posted Nov 14th, 2016 By Johannes Åkesson in Release Updates With | No CommentsSQL Spreads 4.0.27 is now available for download. Improved support for installing on Terminal Server. Fixed issue when saving documents with +250k database rows. Download the latest version of SQL Spreads »

Johannes Åkesson
Worked in the Business Intelligence industry for the last 15+ years. Founder of SQL Spreads – the data management solution to import, update and manage SQL Server data from within Excel.
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