Copilot: Improve Excel Data Quality

Key insights

• Two Copilot modes: Microsoft Excel offers a one-click Clean Data scan that flags issues and shows suggestion cards, and a Copilot pane where you give plain-English prompts for precise, targeted cleanup.
  
• What Copilot catches and fixes: it finds spacing and capitalization errors, number-format problems, spelling inconsistencies, duplicates, currency stored as text, and blanks; it can standardize text, remove duplicates, fill missing values, and add formula or summary rows.
  
• Prepare data for best results: convert ranges to a table, use clear header names, keep one fact per column, and avoid merged cells or mixed totals to let Copilot work reliably.
  
• Simple workflow and controls: open Data > Clean Data or call Copilot, review each suggested change, and choose Apply or Ignore; give Copilot column names or context to improve accuracy.
  
• Practical benefits: Copilot speeds cleanup, enforces consistent formatting, reduces duplicates and obvious errors, and improves analysis quality by letting you describe tasks in natural language instead of writing formulas.
  
• Limits and one key habit: Copilot works best on well-structured sheets—use Power Query or manual normalization first for very messy workbooks. Always ask Copilot to highlight problems and review suggestions instead of letting it silently change data.
  

Keywords

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