Winning the Microsoft Excel World Championship: The smartest esport you didn’t know existed
The Microsoft Excel World Championship 2025 has concluded, with Diarmuid Early defeating 23 other Grand Final competitors to take the title.
Taking place at the Las Vegas HyperX Arena, the event unites the world’s smartest spreadsheet speedrunners in pursuing one common goal – to be the fastest, most efficient Microsoft Excel esports player on the planet.
How does the Microsoft Excel World Championship work?
Microsoft Excel World Championship contestants are given a puzzle-style challenge that is based entirely within an Excel spreadsheet. This is referred to as a “Case.” Competitors must solve several levels of this Case, increasing in difficulty, to win.
Each Case level is assigned a certain number of points. These points are awarded in full upon completing a level. There are also individual questions within each level, for which points are also awarded upon completion.
Alongside the Case levels, there are bonuses. Bonuses are only eligible for the first six who score them. This means that if you are the seventh individual to complete a bonus task, you do not receive any additional points.
In the Grand Final, they have 40 minutes to solve the case, rather than the standard 30-minute time limit in standard matches.
Every five minutes of the Grand Final, the player with the fewest points on the board will be eliminated. This continues until only six of the starting twelve competitors remain. From there, it is simply a race to the finish line.
Featuring intense problem-solving, time pressure, various strategies, and a fast-changing scoreboard, Excel Esports has solidified its competitive identity.
With the inaugural Chess Tournament at the Esports World Cup pushing problem-solving competitive games into the spotlight this year, Microsoft Excel may not be far behind.
The 2025 Grand Final Case: A complex fold-based conundrum
The Japanese art of Origami inspired the 2025 Microsoft Excel World Championship Grand Final Case. Competitors had to work out exactly how the “paper” created within the spreadsheet could be folded in particular ways using Excel coding.
Easier levels covered simple folds. However, as the levels progressed, competitors faced up to three separate folds and diagonal angles.
Within the seven Grand Final levels, there were 130 questions and five bonus questions.
This year, the Championship also featured its own theme song. Appropriately named “The Excel World Championship Song,” the theme’s lyrics include “who’s going in the spreadsheet bin” and “who’s getting stuck in the fuction sand.”
Diarmuid Easy wins the 2025 Microsoft Excel World Championship
Following a year of gruelling competition, 12 Grand Finalists entered the Microsoft Excel World Championship arena, anticipating a thrilling conclusion to the 2025 season.
The Road to Las Vegas began all the way back in January’s Battle 1. Across the 2025 season, a total of 9 Battle tournaments, a 250+ player online season, Last Chance Qualifiers, Wildcards, and Local Chapters paved the way to the Grand Final.
Irish representative Diarmuid Early was the first player to answer all 130 questions in the Grand Final Case (the puzzle-style challenge presented to each competitor in the form of an Excel spreadsheet), winning the competition overall.
For winning the tournament, he took home $5,000 USD (~£3,750 GBP), a trophy, and the Microsoft Excel World Championship’s iconic wrestling-style winners’ belt.
In the first 10 minutes, Diarmuid Early employed a riskier initial strategy. He focused on establishing a groundwork strategy rather than speeding through earlier levels.
While this can be incredibly beneficial later in the Case, it can leave players at risk of an early elimination due to low points.
Diarmuid moved from 8th position to 4th position between the 10th and 15th minutes. By the halfway point, he had completed every bonus question.
Here, casters noted that his 4th-place position was, in fact, deceptive given his bonus-question supremacy and foundational strategy. They predicted that Diarmuid would “launch up the leaderboard.”
This prediction came to fruition only two minutes later, with Diarmuid reaching the top of the table for the first time in the Grand Final. He maintained this lead for the remaining allotted time before completing the full set of questions with 5 minutes to spare.
Full Results:
- Diarmuid Early (Completed Case)
- Andrew Ngai (finished on 942 points)
- Jean Wolleh (finished on 913 points)
- Michael Jarman (finished on 868 points)
- Ha Dang (finished on 838 points)
- Juan Cifuentes (finished on 706 points)
- Jackson Newton (eliminated on 555 points)
- Nick Lowman (eliminated on 543 points)
- Zhang Yunyi (eliminated on 419 points)
- Jack Franken (eliminated on 240 points)
- Ben Carr (eliminated on 174 points)
- Coby Dombrowsky (eliminated on 4 points)
Open to all spreadsheet Geeks, everywhere: Excel Esports’ history, and how you can get involved
Competitive Microsoft Excel Esports has a 20-year history, continually presenting new challenges to spreadsheet enthusiasts year after year.
Cases range in difficulty and style. Some are heavily numerical (which is seen as more traditional), whereas others (such as the 2025 Microsoft Excel World Championship Final) are strongly influenced by visual inspiration.
Whether numerically or visually weighted, all Excel Esports Cases feature the same core mechanics and goals. Overall, competitors must utilise a combination of rapid strategising, acute problem solving, and raw spreadsheet coding skills to emerge victorious.
Those wishing to reach the Vegas Championship can do so through any of the nine “Road to Vegas” Battles. Usually, these Battles take place monthly between January and September, as seen in the 2025 season.
Entry fees for these monthly Battles are a mere $20 USD.
There are also regional qualification rounds and competitive slots awarded to other competitors in the broader FMWC (Financial Modelling World Cup) community, to which Microsoft Excel Esports belongs.
Communities for these competitions exist worldwide, including in the UK.
With a low entry cost and dedicated global community, Microsoft Excel may well be one of the most unique hidden gems in the esports industry.
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