All the Office theme changes in Microsoft 365
Microsoft is changing more than just the font in Microsoft 365, there are also default color scheme and even line changes coming too. Here’s all the proposed changes and how to reverse them. New Default Fonts We’ve already talked about the new default fonts, Aptos and Aptos Display. New default font, Aptos, in Microsoft 365 […]
Excel’s Stock / Currency data (kinda, sorta) gets auto-refresh
Microsoft Excel has caught up with the needs of investors by adding automatic refresh of Stock prices and Currency data. Office Watch will explain what’s now possible and its limitations. Don’t get too excited, we’ve waited so long and when Microsoft does respond, the auto-refresh options don’t go far enough, isn’t properly configurable and doesn’t […]
Mt Fuji 🗻 symbols in Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook
How to insert the Mount Fuji 🗻 or snow-capped mountain into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook. Both in Office for Windows and Office for Mac. Mount Fuji (富士山 or Fujisan) is a Japanese Holy Site and World Heritage Listed. The symbol or emoji 🗻can be used for the famous mountain or any time you want […]
Which Microsoft Office feature badly needs a fix?
For all the changes Microsoft has made to Search (aka Tell Me), they continue to ignore one basic that would make Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook a lot easier to work with. Here’s some examples of how Microsoft Office search badly needs fixing. Search (formerly called “Tell Me”) usually appears in the title bar as […]
Changes to Sharing options in Microsoft Office
The Sharing options in Office are changing, yet again with a new ‘sharing experience’ in all Microsoft Office 365 apps for desktop, web and mobile. We’ll explain the changes, including a few options that Microsoft hasn’t mentioned. All the usual Microsoft buzzwords have been recycled to describe these changes; “streamlined”, “simplified”, “free of distraction”, “experience” […]
Three ways to insert a Recycle symbol ♻ in Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook
Three ways to insert the Recycle symbol ♻ into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook. Both in Office for Windows and Office for Mac. There are many different and specialist Recycle symbols. We’ll focus on the standard, generic symbol, officially called “Black Universal Recycling Symbol” in three forms: Emoji or Unicode symbol, Office Icon and the […]
Teardrop-Spoked Asterisk ✻ in Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook
Insert the Teardrop-Spoked Asterisk ✻ into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook. Both in Office for Windows and Office for Mac. Heavy Teardrop-Spoked Asterisk ✻ symbol has a circle in the middle with six ‘teardrop’ spokes around it. It has no specific purpose but is a more decorative alternative to the standard asterix * or other bullet […]
Investment Rate of Return is easy in Excel
Excel’s IRR() function is a straightforward way to calculate the rate of return for investments which have regular return/payment dates with amounts which might vary. Such as a simple fixed-interest bond, where cash flows occur at regular intervals such as monthly or yearly. When expressed as a percentage return, it’s a lot simpler to understand. […]
Easily calculate stock and asset returns in Excel
There’s a nice little Excel function that will calculate the rate of return on any asset like a stock or fund including income/dividends with purchases and sales over time. The secret sauce is XIRR() a function which calculates an internal rate of return with uneven interest or dividend payments. In other words, common real-world situations. […]
Scanning from within Microsoft Word or Office
Can you scan a picture or document directly into Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook? Certainly, but these days we’re spoiled for choice and have fantastic features like using a smartphone as a simple scanner. Back in the day, you could click a button in Word 2003 to scan a document or image and drop it […]
The faster way to insert pictures into Office documents
An easy and fast way to add pictures into Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook. We mentioned a faster way to get a scanned image into Word via the ‘scan to clipboard’ option available in some scanning software. There are similar options available for copying existing image files into Word, Excel or PowerPoint documents as well […]
New default styles in Excel 365
The change of fonts in Microsoft 365 also means the default styles are also changing in Excel 365. Here’s what the new styles look like and the exact settings Microsoft has chosen in Excel 365 for Windows and Mac. The new Excel defaults for a worksheet mostly use Aptos Narrow with a little Aptos Display. […]
Excel can figure out how long to pay off a loan
Microsoft Excel has a handy function called NPER that can help you work out how long it’ll take to pay off a loan. It’ll show how adding even a little bit per payment can help clear a loan faster and some practical advice on using NPER in the real world. Say you have a personal […]
Excel can figure out payments to clear credit card debt
Let Excel help you cut your credit card debt by calculating the monthly payments needed to pay off the card. The PMT function in Excel calculates of loan payments needed to clear the debt in a certain time. Suppose there is a remaining balance of $5,400 on a credit card with an annual interest rate […]
Predict the future value of your investments with Excel
Excel can calculate the future value of your investments, such as finding out a return you’ll get on a Certificate of Deposit (CD) or Term Deposit. There’s an inbuilt Excel function to make the task very simple. It’s just one way Excel can make your financial decisions a whole lot easier. Future Value of a […]
FIRST LOOK: Excel’s six new AI Copilot functions
Excel’s new AI functions, under the Copilot branding, have started to appear in some public releases. Here’s the full list with syntax of all six AI functions. The functions have started appearing in some Excel 365 for Windows, Insiders Beta (version 2308 build 16708.20004). Not all Insiders see the same functions because Microsoft sometimes does […]
