By Thomas Claburn
Publication Date: 2026-09-25 19:58:00
applications
Once a single-scalar home, spreadsheet cells are being redeveloped to handle many tenants
Microsoft has ended 40 years of single-occupancy for Excel cells and is now allowing multiple values to inhabit the same home.
“One of the oldest rules of spreadsheets: one cell, one value,” said Jake Armstrong, senior product manager for Excel, in a LinkedIn post. “No longer!”
“I’m excited to announce a set of new features: Lists, Arrays in Cells and Nested Arrays in Excel.”
For the time being, this capability is only available in Microsoft Excel for Windows and Mac Beta Channels. And it is opt-in.
To make the case for lists in cells, Armstrong in a blog post explained that each Excel project can have multiple owners.
“Traditionally, you’d need separate columns, helper tables, or text like ‘Carlos,…
