Already in Excel: formulas and View Side by Side
Every desktop Excel can compare two sheets with a formula sheet (=IF(Sheet1!A1<>Sheet2!A1, …)) or conditional formatting, and View › View Side by Side with synchronous scrolling puts two windows next to each other for reading by eye. They cost nothing, but they compare cell positions, not records: if a row was inserted or the sort order changed, everything below lights up. Our guide on comparing two Excel sheets shows the formulas and the ID-lookup workaround.
Microsoft Spreadsheet Compare
Microsoft’s own comparison program produces a report of differences between two workbooks, covering entered values, formulas, calculated values and other categories. According to Microsoft’s support article, it is only available with Office Professional Plus 2013, 2016 or 2019, or Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise, and it is started from the Windows Start screen. If you have one of those editions on Windows it is worth a look; most home, small-business and Mac users won’t have it.
Paid desktop tools
- xlCompare lists a Professional licence for one user at $99.99, sold as a perpetual licence with updates and support included, installed from an
.msi(Windows) package. - Synkronizer lists €99.00 per licence for one to four licences, perpetual rather than subscription, with major upgrades at 50% of the retail price.
- Diffchecker includes Excel and CSV comparison in its Pro plan, listed at $15 per user per month on its “Pro + Desktop” plan. Its pricing table lists “Your files never leave your device” and fully offline use as features of the Desktop app rather than of the web version.
These are capable products with features RowDiff doesn’t have (comparing formatting, VBA, merging changes back). If you compare workbooks every day as your job, one of them may be the right buy. Prices and terms change, so check the vendor’s page before you buy.
RowDiff
- Price: free to compare on screen, for sheets up to 5,000 rows, as often as you like. Downloading the highlighted
.xlsxreport or the CSV of differences, and comparing larger files, uses one credit per pair of sheets: 10 credits for £5, or 50 for £15. Credits don’t expire, and there is no subscription. - Where it runs: in your web browser. Nothing to install and no account.
- Your files: opened and compared by code in the browser tab, never uploaded. When you spend a credit, the browser sends your key and a SHA-256 fingerprint of the pair of sheets, not their contents.
- What it compares: values (or formulas) row by row, matching rows by a key column or by aligning them in order; changed cells, added and removed rows, extra columns; number tolerance and case/space options; plus a reconcile mode for two lists.
- What it doesn’t: formatting, comments, charts, macros, or merging changes back into a workbook.
Which one to use
For a one-off check of two sheets with an identical layout, a formula sheet in Excel is fine. For record lists that change order, have rows added and removed, or come from different systems (a CSV export against a workbook), match rows by a key: RowDiff does that free on screen. For daily professional workbook auditing that includes formatting and macros, a desktop tool or Spreadsheet Compare (if your Office edition includes it) does more.
Vendor details were read from each vendor’s own pricing or support page on 8 November 2026. RowDiff is not affiliated with any of the products named here.
Related: Compare two Excel sheets · Compare two Excel files for differences · Compare two CSV files