Powerquery vs VBA (vs Javascript?) for programming in Excel

Hi Team,

I've not found much online about this so wanted to get your thoughts. I want to learn how to program Excel so I can handle more advanced situations (import, clean and manipulate data for custom reports from external sources). I have next to zero experience with writing my own code in Excel so first wanted to understand what I should be looking at.

I know Excel allows functionality i'm looking for in both powerquery and vba (and potentially moving forward with Javascript) but what should i concentrate on learning first? I wanted to concentrate on learning one technology which i'm sure will cover most of my use cases in any of hte programming options Excel but i didnt want to spread myself too thin by looking at multiple things at the same time. I'm also hoping to future proof myself in that what I learn will not be ideal in later versions of Excel. Does anyone have thoughts on this?

thanks
Gary

you should learn VBA first, because it's the most simplistic of any language on the market, in terms of a variety of things. I just posted this, for a very good reason. It's funny you posted THIS thread of yours too. It may prove useful to you:

https://www.excelforum.com/tips-and-...-material.html

by the way, javascript can do literally anything when running on a local windows machine.

I would make sure you're very familiar with all the formulas in Excel, especially the newer ones in 365 like FILTER, UNIQUE, XLOOKUP, etc. These can actually do things that one would have used VBA for previously, but now can do with just formulas.

If a solution can be VBA or formulas, I'd use formulas instead.

Thanks both, yes i think i still have plenty to learn with formulas, I will look at VBA as well, thanks vba_php - that material looks fantastic!