Is Microsoft Excel the Next Big E-Sport?

2 weeks ago 12

U.S.|Twelve Dudes and a Hype Tunnel: Scenes from the ‘Super Bowl for Excel Nerds’

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/20/us/microsoft-excel-world-championships.html

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The Great Read

At the Microsoft Excel World Championship in Las Vegas, there was stardust in the air as 12 finance guys vied to be crowned the world’s best spreadsheeter.

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transcript

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Highlights From the Microsoft Excel World Championship

The event’s organizer hopes to turn competitive Excel into a popular e-sport where pros compete for million-dollar prizes and big-league glory. That’s still a ways off.

♫ It’s the Excel World Championship. ♫ ♫ Who is going to win? ♫ “The Annihilator. The Child from Chile.” ♫ Who’s going in the spreadsheet bin? ♫ “You are not prepared.” “None of us are.” “Three, two, one, Excel!” “This is a tough case.” “It is.” “Oh, look at that. And he’s made the numbers out of it on off to the side.” “10 seconds.” “Come on.” “Anything. Is anything going to happen?” “Michael Jarman—” “Look at that!” “Takes the win. All those years of training have come to this moment in 2024.” “The world championship.”

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The event’s organizer hopes to turn competitive Excel into a popular e-sport where pros compete for million-dollar prizes and big-league glory. That’s still a ways off.CreditCredit...Mikayla Whitmore for The New York Times

Reporting by Yan Zhuang

Photographs by Mikayla Whitmore

Videos by Shawn Paik

Yan Zhuang, an Excel novice, reported from an e-sports arena in a Las Vegas hotel.

Jan. 20, 2025Updated 6:20 a.m. ET

Like soccer players taking the field in a giant stadium, the 12 finalists ran through a glowing “hype tunnel,” some wearing jerseys with sponsorship logos. As an announcer bellowed introductions and cameras captured their every move, they approached a neon-lit stage to raucous cheers.

Then the men sat down at desktop computers, opened their Microsoft Excel spreadsheets and began to type.

Excel, a program that does complex math on a human’s behalf, is often associated, rightly, with corporate drudgery. But last month, in a Las Vegas e-sports arena that typically hosts Fortnite and League of Legends tournaments, finance professionals fluent in spreadsheets were treated like minor celebrities as they gathered to solve devilishly complex Excel puzzles in front of an audience of about 400 people, and more watching an ESPN3 livestream.

Organizers call the event the Microsoft Excel World Championship. “Yes, it is a thing,” the official website says.

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People standing near computer screens under red lights, reading.
Excel contestants reading instructions at the HyperX Arena in Las Vegas.

At stake was a $5,000 prize, a wrestling-style championship belt and the title of world’s best spreadsheeter. But the organizer, Andrew Grigolyunovich, is dreaming bigger. He hopes to turn competitive Excel into a popular e-sport where pros compete for million-dollar prizes and big-league glory.


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