Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

ChatGPT for Excel

chatgpt.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 209 posts

Re: ChatGPT for Excel

#181

Post by dgsegesg »

brian-jones wrote: post #178
lateforwork wrote: post #4

This looks bad for Microsoft. They added a Copilot button to all their products but it doesn't do much more than open a chat side panel. I recently tried Claude Cowork for PowerPoint and I was stunned by the content as well as design quality of the deck it produced. That's a threat for Microsoft because now you don't need the editing tools of PowerPoint, AI replaces it, so all you need is the presentation mode of Pow…

I run the Excel team at Microsoft. The experience you're describing sounds like it's from the earlier versions of Copilot in Excel that were genuinely limited. Today, Excel Copilot takes a model-forward approach where we give the models full access to Excel's capabilities. We give customers the choice of the latest models from both OpenAI and Anthropic, and we encourage the models to iteratively explore the spreadshe…

Current model is inauthentically limited?

"If you tried it a few months ago and walked away, it's worth another look." You shouldn't have shoved trash down people's throats a few months ago then?

Re: ChatGPT for Excel

#182

Post by sqircles »

dgsegesg wrote: post #181
brian-jones wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I run the Excel team at Microsoft. The experience you're describing sounds like it's from the earlier versions of Copilot in Excel that were genuinely limited. Today, Excel Copilot takes a model-forward approach where we give the models full access to Excel's capabilities. We give customers the choice of the latest models from both OpenAI and Anthropic, and we encourage the models to iteratively explore the spreadshe…

Current model is inauthentically limited? "If you tried it a few months ago and walked away, it's worth another look." You shouldn't have shoved trash down people's throats a few months ago then?

> You shouldn't have shoved trash down people's throats a few months ago then?

:s/You/MS

While I agree the widespread "race to market" with crap probably does and should hurt the success of these "AI-enabled apps," that particular area probably was not this individuals decision.

Re: ChatGPT for Excel

#183

Post by sotix »

strongpigeon wrote: post #50
p_ing wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the nature of these add-ins. Modern Add-ins are all little XML frames with some JS or whatever. All processing occurs server-side, hosted by the add-in publisher. This is counter to the old (security nightmare) COM model where processing could be local.

To clarify: add-ins are essentially web pages. They can do some processing client side if they want, but yeah in the case of a ChatGPT add-in it's not like they're running the model in a web frame.

Exactly. My company's add-in is a React app, which can be fun to debug with the limited developer tools in Word/Excel's browser.

Re: ChatGPT for Excel

#184

Post by drc500free »

brian-jones wrote: post #178
lateforwork wrote: post #4

This looks bad for Microsoft. They added a Copilot button to all their products but it doesn't do much more than open a chat side panel. I recently tried Claude Cowork for PowerPoint and I was stunned by the content as well as design quality of the deck it produced. That's a threat for Microsoft because now you don't need the editing tools of PowerPoint, AI replaces it, so all you need is the presentation mode of Pow…

I run the Excel team at Microsoft. The experience you're describing sounds like it's from the earlier versions of Copilot in Excel that were genuinely limited. Today, Excel Copilot takes a model-forward approach where we give the models full access to Excel's capabilities. We give customers the choice of the latest models from both OpenAI and Anthropic, and we encourage the models to iteratively explore the spreadshe…

Does Copilot behave differently in Excel depending on whether you got the premium subscription instead of what is included with Business?

Many people I've talked to about Copilot don't realize that the dedicated "Premium" Copilot is a completely different experience than the "Basic/Lobotomized" Copilot that comes with a standard Business subscription.

It's like you're running a freemium model where no one was actually responsible for implementing the upsell, or making sure the free version is useful and compelling. E.g. a Copilot pane in Outlook that says it can't access your emails, doesn't explain how, and doesn't mention an upgrade path that will allow it to.

Re: ChatGPT for Excel

#185

Post by dueltmp_yufsy »

I already use AI to help recall the various macros. I think this is a great use case for real world impact of AI. So many jobs still rely on Excel as central facet of analysis. I'm looking forward to trying it myself.

Re: ChatGPT for Excel

#186

Post by Abster1 »

brian-jones wrote: post #178
lateforwork wrote: post #4

This looks bad for Microsoft. They added a Copilot button to all their products but it doesn't do much more than open a chat side panel. I recently tried Claude Cowork for PowerPoint and I was stunned by the content as well as design quality of the deck it produced. That's a threat for Microsoft because now you don't need the editing tools of PowerPoint, AI replaces it, so all you need is the presentation mode of Pow…

I run the Excel team at Microsoft. The experience you're describing sounds like it's from the earlier versions of Copilot in Excel that were genuinely limited. Today, Excel Copilot takes a model-forward approach where we give the models full access to Excel's capabilities. We give customers the choice of the latest models from both OpenAI and Anthropic, and we encourage the models to iteratively explore the spreadshe…

I've had a really good time with the new Copilot in Excel. I like the model selector and tend to use Opus 4.6.

Q for you Brian, I have the Microsoft 365 Premium individual plan ($200/yr). I got 50% off the premium plan as well when Microsoft was offering discounts.

I've noticed when I use Claude or GPT through the Copilot model selector I don't see any costs for my api usage anywhere. Does Microsoft eat that for now?

Re: ChatGPT for Excel

#187

Post by ozgurds »

We were already using AI in excel but manuallay copy pasting the macros and doing the things by ourselves. This will make us save really much time. When you have automated macros it is really fun to deal with excels.

Re: ChatGPT for Excel

#189

Post by brian-jones »

Abster1 wrote: post #186
brian-jones wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I run the Excel team at Microsoft. The experience you're describing sounds like it's from the earlier versions of Copilot in Excel that were genuinely limited. Today, Excel Copilot takes a model-forward approach where we give the models full access to Excel's capabilities. We give customers the choice of the latest models from both OpenAI and Anthropic, and we encourage the models to iteratively explore the spreadshe…

I've had a really good time with the new Copilot in Excel. I like the model selector and tend to use Opus 4.6. Q for you Brian, I have the Microsoft 365 Premium individual plan ($200/yr). I got 50% off the premium plan as well when Microsoft was offering discounts. I've noticed when I use Claude or GPT through the Copilot model selector I don't see any costs for my api usage anywhere. Does Microsoft eat that for now?

Glad you're enjoying it! Opus 4.6 is great, and we've started rolling out 4.7 today.

Your M365 Copilot Premium plan includes extensive usage of the Copilot features, including the model selector, and there are no additional API costs.

Re: ChatGPT for Excel

#190

Post by hazelnut »

angadsg wrote: post #61

Hi everyone, engineer on ChatGPT for Excel here - we launched ChatGPT for Excel to bring the power of GPT-5.4 to Excel. Keen to hear feedback and happy to answer any questions!

Do you also have Google Spreadsheets on your radar?
Post reply on HN