There’s no denying that the way we work with data has changed dramatically since Microsoft introduced Excel in 1987. Nearly four decades later, organizations operate data lakes, cloud warehouses, and petabyte-scale databases. Yet despite all this innovation, Microsoft Excel remains one of the most widely used tools for data analysis in the world.

What’s surprising isn’t that people still use Excel, it’s that so much of the work done there is manual, repetitive, and accepted as “just the way things are.”

The good news?
It doesn’t have to be.

Excel is far more powerful than many users realize. Even if you’re fluent in VLOOKUP, XLOOKUP, or CONCATENATE, you may not know that Excel can function as a full extract, transform, load (ETL) tool—capable of automating data preparation workflows end to end.

That capability lives inside Excel in a feature called Power Query.

Power Query and ETL Explained

If you’re unfamiliar with ETL, it can sound more complicated than it really is. Data engineers often talk about “ETL pipelines” and “ETL tools,” which makes it feel like something reserved for specialized technical teams.

In reality, ETL simply means:

• Extract data from one or more sources
• Transform it into a usable format
• Load it into a destination for analysis or reporting

And yes, you can do all of this directly in Excel.

Microsoft describes Power Query as a way to analyze data inside Excel while connecting seamlessly to external data sources. Power Query lets you reshape, clean, and prepare data automatically, without rewriting formulas every time new data arrives.

With Power Query, Excel becomes more than a spreadsheet: It becomes a repeatable, refreshable ETL engine.

Why Manual Excel Data Prep Doesn’t Scale

Before Power Query, most data manipulation in Excel was done manually or with formulas and pivot tables. Common tasks included:

• Removing unnecessary columns
• Filtering rows
• Grouping or aggregating data
• Pivoting and unpivoting tables
• Splitting strings into substrings
• Extracting keywords from text
• Appending rows from other files
• Joining datasets together

While these steps work, they come with drawbacks:

• They’re time-consuming
• They’re error-prone
• They have to be repeated every time data changes
• They don’t scale across teams

Power Query replaces these fragile, manual steps with repeatable transformations that can refresh automatically whenever the source data changes.

The Benefits of Using ETL (Even in Excel)

ETL isn’t just about convenience. It directly improves data quality and decision-making.

Manage Complex Data Efficiently

ETL allows you to perform calculations, string manipulation, joins, and transformations across multiple datasets without rewriting logic each time.

Improve Business Intelligence

Well-structured data improves analytics. ETL ensures leaders analyze information that’s clean, consistent, and aligned with business rules, supporting better operational and strategic decisions.

Gain Timely Access to Data

Instead of spending time re-extracting and re-cleaning data, ETL pipelines refresh automatically. This gives teams a single, reliable source of truth without manual intervention.

Using Excel as an ETL Tool with Power Query

Data migration itself is often straightforward. The real bottleneck is everything that comes before it: discovering data, cleaning it, standardizing formats, and managing updates over time.

Power Query simplifies all of that and lets you do it in Excel, the tool your team already knows.

In Excel 2016 and later, Power Query is built in. To access it:

1. Open Excel
2. Click the Data tab
3. Use the Get & Transform Data section

Step 1: Extract

Extraction pulls data from external sources into Excel while keeping the original data intact.

Power Query supports sources such as:

• CSV and text files
• Databases
• SharePoint
• XML and HTML
• Web APIs
• Excel files
• ERP and CRM exports

To extract data, go to Data → Get Data and choose the appropriate source.

Step 2: Transform

Transformation is where Power Query shines. This is where raw data becomes usable.

Typical transformations include:

• Sorting and filtering rows
• Adding, removing, or renaming columns
• Creating calculated columns
• Grouping and aggregating values
• Merging or appending datasets

Most transformation steps are applied through the Power Query interface, no formulas required. Each step is recorded and automatically reapplied on refresh.

Step 3: Load

Once transformations are complete:

1. Click Home in the Power Query editor
2. Select Close & Load

Your clean, transformed dataset loads into Excel, ready for analysis, reporting, or visualization.

And because the process is automated, future updates require just one click.

ETL, Excel, and ExtendInsights

At CloudExtend, we help organizations go beyond basic Excel ETL by automating data extraction directly from NetSuite and other systems.

With ExtendInsights, users can:

• Extract NetSuite saved searches directly into Excel
• Clean and transform data using Power Query
• Refresh reports on demand or on a schedule
• Combine NetSuite data with other sources
• Visualize results in Excel or Power BI
• Upload transformed data back into NetSuite

This creates a seamless ETL workflow where Excel becomes both the transformation layer and the analytics environment without manual exports or CSV juggling.

ExtendInsights turns Excel into a live, connected data workspace rather than a static spreadsheet.

Why Excel ETL Works So Well

Using Excel for ETL offers key advantages:

• Familiar interface
• Lower learning curve
• Faster adoption across teams
• Transparent transformation logic
• Easy troubleshooting and iteration

Instead of building custom pipelines or relying on IT for every change, business users can own their data workflows while still maintaining accuracy and repeatability.

Ready to Modernize Your Data Workflow?

Excel has evolved far beyond rows and columns. With Power Query and ExtendInsights, it becomes a powerful ETL platform capable of handling complex, repeatable data transformations at scale.

If you’re still cleaning and reshaping data manually, it’s time to let Excel do the heavy lifting.

Try ExtendInsights free for two weeks and see how effortless ETL in Excel can be, no credit card required.