Microsoft Excel is the MVP of the spreadsheet world, but that doesn’t mean that alternatives like Apple Numbers aren’t useful. In fact, there are a few things that Apple Numbers does even better than Excel, and Aple’s free spreadsheet app shouldn’t be underestimated.

1 Numbers Produces More Visually Appealing Graphs

One of my biggest pet peeves with Excel is that any kind of media content made using it, like graphs or charts, looks the same. Boring might be one word, but basic is probably better—it does what it does, and the end result is fine.

There’s nothing wrong with that, but if you’ve seen one Excel chart, you’ve seen them all. There’s very little you can do to make it look better. Apple Numbers, in contrast, creates far more visually appealing graphs and charts that, to the casual and uninformed viewer, look professionally made.

If you’re looking to jazz up your spreadsheets with fancier graphs, Numbers is the better option.

2 Enjoy Better Templates With Numbers

Apple has always had a talent for creating products that look good. As the graphs suggest, Numbers allows users to make very impressive graphs, but the preset templates it provides can turn your spreadsheet data from boring to exciting.

Like the graphs, this is all down to how Apple has designed Numbers—it has infused it with the philosophy that great design makes for a great product. Like Excel, this includes options for different types of spreadsheet data, whether it’s a personal budget or a business stock list.

Unlike Excel or Google Sheets, however, these templates don’t look like templates. They look like professionally made, individually crafted spreadsheet designs that stand out.

3 Numbers Offers a More Flexible Canvas for Your Data

Apple Numbers follows much of Microsoft Excel’s tried-and-tested formula, but one way it strongly differs is in how you can manage your data on-screen. Excel sticks very strongly to a strict, rigid cell structure that doesn’t allow much manipulation of how to position your data, although charts and images can be placed on top.

This isn’t ideal, as it makes it harder to organize complex spreadsheets with different types of media content. In contrast, Numbers offers a much more flexible canvas, allowing you to place pictures, charts, text boxes, and numbers wherever you like.

It doesn’t do away with the cells, but by being less rigid, Numbers does allow you to switch up the design of your spreadsheet to incorporate those other types of media, as required.

4 Advanced Formatting Is Easier in Numbers

It’s tricky to get the formatting right in your spreadsheet, but in my experience, advanced features like conditional formatting aren’t intuitive to use in Excel. It’s a powerful tool, but if I were a beginner, I wouldn’t find the Excel approach to formatting to be easy to understand.

In contrast, Numbers is a whole lot easier. It doesn’t dumb things down, and it still follows a similar approach. However, the user interface in Numbers makes it a lot easier to create conditional highlighting rules that both work and look appealing, using simple language to guide you through making rules that work effectively with the data you’ve inserted.

5 Numbers Can Better Export to Other Formats Like PDF

Ever tried to export an Excel spreadsheet into another format, like a PDF? While it is possible, the grid structure of an Excel spreadsheet doesn’t easily lend itself to fitting onto a typical, letter-sized (A4) paper sheet. Numbers isn’t perfect for this, either, but the less rigid approach, and the more appealing color schemes and media content it creates, makes it the better option for exporting to other types of documents.

For example, let’s assume that you want to convert a spreadsheet containing a list of business transactions into a printable, easy-to-understand list as a PDF. You could certainly do this in Excel, but Numbers makes it easier, giving you the ability to quickly show or hide features like table headers or page margins, as well as scaling up and down your content.

The design of a Numbers spreadsheet, thanks to the colors and presets, makes it a more appealing option for printing, too. The easier canvas-style sheets can also be more easily manipulated prior to printing to make it fit a printed sheet better.

6 Collaborate More Easily Across Apple Devices

Microsoft offers mobile apps for Office, and thanks to OneDrive integration, you can open up and edit a spreadsheet in Excel on your PC, and then shift to a mobile device like an iPad. However, it isn’t perfect.

On more than one occasion, this integration has failed me, with Excel on an iPad refusing to autosave a spreadsheet opened from OneDrive without warning, causing data loss. A quick Google search shows this isn’t necessarily an isolated issue, either.

I’ve never experienced this with Numbers. When I switch from my Mac to my iPad and access a spreadsheet from my iCloud storage, Numbers works perfectly. Apple’s iCloud integration makes it harder (but not impossible) to share spreadsheets outside of Apple infrastructure, but the tighter integration makes it a much better option to collaborate across Apple devices.

7 A Friendly Starting Point for Spreadsheet Newcomers

I’ve used Excel for years, and the one word I can’t use to describe it is easy. It has some simple features and can be used in a basic way, but it isn’t as friendly as other Office products for beginners to understand.

Numbers is by far the more beginner-friendly app. This lower barrier of entry makes it a much better option for casual users who aren’t looking to memorize a huge list of formulas or features. The one downside, however, is that there are fewer learning resources for Numbers, but the UI does a better job at guiding users to the right places compared to Excel anyway.

Don’t get me wrong—I’m not a total Numbers convert. I think Excel is still the best spreadsheet tool out there, and there are some onboarding tips that can make it more accessible for newcomers But that doesn’t mean that Numbers is worthless. It’s easier to use and understand, creates aesthetically pleasing spreadsheets, and just like Excel, I can use it to work out my budget.

I won’t give Excel up entirely but in the years I’ve owned my Mac, I’ve found myself switching to Numbers more and more. If you’ve never used it before, open it up now—it might just surprise you.