Mathematica Link for Excel enables you to share data and calculations between Mathematica and Microsoft Excel.

These instructions assume that Mathematica Link for Excel is downloaded and installed on your computer.

Here we showcase the first few steps in using ExcelLink to connect to Excel from Mathematica. For connecting to Mathematica from Excel, see here.

Advanced information can be found in the Mathematica Link for Excel documentation.

Connecting ExcelLink to Mathematica

To start using the link from inside Mathematica, load the ExcelLink package.

<< ExcelLink` 

This loads a library of functions and symbols into Mathematica.

Writing Text or Data to an Excel Sheet

Assign the value to the Excel function with the Excel cell ID as the argument. This puts the string "hello" in cell A1 in the active spreadsheet.

Excel["A1"] = "hello" 

Placing a Graphic in Excel

This creates a graphic in Mathematica and assigns it to a cell. The upper-left corner of this plot appears in cell B3.

g = Plot[Sin[a^2], {a, -3, 3}, PlotStyle -> Blue, Frame -> True, ImageSize -> 200]; 
Excel["B3"] = g 

Reading from an Excel sheet

Data from an Excel spreadsheet can be read into Mathematica using the Excel function and the range of addresses.

Excel["A2:A6"]

Note that numerical data is read as floating-point (real) numbers.

Saving an Excel Sheet

Changes in an Excel spreadsheet can be saved from Mathematica using the ExcelSave[] function.