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Excel and R

Why is R better than Excel?

  • Data manipulation. R allows you to manipulate (select, recode, retrieve) data very quickly. R is much more adept and efficient at data preparation than Excel.
  • Easier automation. R uses a scripting language rather than a graphical user interface, so it is much easier to automate things in R than in Excel.
  • Quick calculation. Due to the automation provided by R, many operations are much faster to perform in R than Excel.
  • Read any type of data.
  • Easier Project Organization. In Excel, projects are often organized on different tabs in the same workbook. This can make Excel files slow, clunky, and difficult to work with. It's easier to keep a project organized when it comes to R because different tasks or sub-projects can be saved in separate files stored in the same folder and linked together in a single project with RStudio.
  • It supports large data sets. Excel has restrictions on the size your data can hold. R supports larger data sizes, and can support large volumes of data with packages like Hadoop.
  • The replicability. R has features that make it much easier to replicate the results of your analysis.
  • R is more accurate than Excel.
  • It's easier to find and fix errors in R than in Excel.
  • It is open source.
  • R has many more (and more advanced) statistical capabilities than Excel.
  • R has advanced graphics capabilities.