HackerTube.dev

You Suck at Excel - Joel Spolsky (Reupload)

Cool Bug Facts · 26.7K views · 2024-04-27 · 54:01

Open on YouTube ↗

If playback is restricted in your region, try opening the original video. Use Mark watched to add it to your marked videos.

Overview

A reupload of Joel Spolsky's talk teaching spreadsheet users the Excel features they are probably missing, such as keyboard navigation, named ranges, tables and lookups. The original disappeared and this copy comes from the Wayback Machine.

On Hacker News

HN commenters call it an internet classic that makes you a more proficient Excel user, and note it is still relevant despite predating newer functions like XLOOKUP.

Recommended by 7 HN people across 6 months · HN mentions 2024–2026

Topics

Productivity & self-improvementData science & statisticsSoftware (other)
Search by tags
excelspreadsheetsjoel spolskydata tableskeyboard shortcuts

What people said

Arainach · 2026-08 · Recommendation

> They force name and number everything which is exactly like using single letter variables, they are only allowed for simple things. This isn't true, named ranges have existed for longer than many (most?) HN readers have been alive. As far as I'm aware they were in the first version in 1985. Joel Spolsky's "you suck at Excel" is more than a decade old but still relevant: [VIDEO]

Read the original HN comment ↗
imurray · 2026-06 · Recommendation

I think you're thinking of "You Suck at Excel" by Joel Spolsky. [VIDEO] Lots of past HN discussion... [LINK] That video was before the introduction of xlookup, which I believe is now worth considering over index and match.

Read the original HN comment ↗
aleph_minus_one · 2025-04 · Recommendation

> Big tools like MSOffice have the ability to be put in hiring contracts: Everyone is assumed to know how to use it, so the company is allowed to deny the no training excuse without spending money. I would claim that if you haven't worked in the finance or insurance industry (or some related industry) for quite some time, you very likely don't know how to use Excel (I have a feeling that a similar points holds for Word and Powerpoint with respect to some industries, but I think for these applications this phenomenon is a little bit less pronounced). Indeed, I'd claim that most books about how to use Excel are simply crap. To just give you a glimpse how to use Excel, here some internet classic on this topic: You Suck at Excel - Joel Spolsky [VIDEO] Really understanding Excel is life task, similar to really understanding modern C++.

Read the original HN comment ↗

Sources

Video by Cool Bug Facts, played through YouTube.

Data and selection notes

HN summaries and labels may contain AI errors. HN dates refer to discussions, not video publication.

HN Library: HackerTube export (2026-10-31) and open-index/hacker-news. Upstream summaries and classifications may contain AI errors.

Views, duration and playback status refresh separately from the published catalog. When an update fails, existing data remains visible.

Selection checks
  • SaaS & AI candidates: Topic keywords do not match
  • Editor-approved picks: Editorial review is required

Rule matches identify candidates. They do not guarantee video quality or financial results.

About the library and its sources