Why is Excel 2016 for Mac so bad?

@ Rod

You never have to give up Excel 2011. It's easy! You simply keep Mac OS at 10.13.6 or earlier and Excel 14.7.7 will run forever.

1. AutoRECOVER is the process used to recover flies that were saved to your local drive. This is not gone away.

AutoSAVE is the process used to recover files that were saved to OndeDrive or SharePoint.

This topic from Excel Help has the details.

Recover files in Office for Mac

2. Not sure what to say about this one. It could me a memory issue. A video processor and RAM issue. If you can nail down a reliable set of steps to reproduce the problem along with an example workbook, that would be really helpful. That kind of issue can be forwarded to the developer team at Microsoft so they can work on it.
3. Yes. I agree that sucks. Send a frown by clicking the Smile button in Excel.
4. I also agree. Send a frown. This is a consequence of dumbing things down to make things easier for those who are new or don't use spreadsheets very much. Also, Microsoft wants us to see the beautiful templates they bought for us to use.
5. This is because of complaints from people who overwrite their files and then want them back. It's makes it harder to destroy your original work. Send a frown and let Microsoft know you prefer the old way.

I have 2011 on my iMac and 2016 on my Macbook Pro.  Neither have the important VBA functions i need - user forms, data input forms etc.  Apart from that i have not noticed any other differences in functionality! Both are very poor versions of the Excel i used to use in Windows and MS should refund their customers immediately from buying either AND provide a FREE copy of the new version when it finally rolls out to compensate our losses.  It is a disgrace and morally wrong to sell an “upgrade” such as these two versions when MS must have known they were functionally crippled.

This will drive MS cuatomers away.  I am already installing alternatives for testing prior to the major Apple upgrade next year.  I cannot afford to mess around with this nonsense.

I’m still using Office 2011 (including Outlook) as Office 2016 is execrable. Even Excel’s (2016) better scrolling behaviour with large spreadsheets doesn’t compensate for its poor usability. However, the problems with Office for Mac are historic and deep rooted. Apple’s insistence on dismissing dialogue boxes between searches (for example) slows me down far more than any other defect although there’s no reason why MS could not implement searching for all instances of a query with one search request!

I really did not like MS forcing me to upgrade for Excel 2011 to 2016. having done so I amn doubly resentful. Not only is it a whole lot more expensive but its is terrible. I am on a Mac and if MS think this is going to forces me back into Windows they are very mistaken. It merely confirms my original decision to leave Windows. Incidentally I have to have (not for much longer!) Win10 on my Mac (in Oracle VirtualBox) and as an OS it sucks. 

1. Auto-recover used to be in a folder of your choice. Now it is somewhere in the MS cloud. I couldn't find it and as soon as you aren't on line guess what ? No auto-recover. That sucks. I now have to remember to save every 5 minutes just like in the late 80's. That sucks. Two days ago I closed a file by mistake and lost 2 hours work. Auto-Recover, allegedly on, was wholly useless. That sucked.
2. What propelled me into this whinge is I am working on a big spreadsheet and trying to select big blocks of data. Dragging the cursor off the edge of the screen doesn't work properly any more. Sometimes it does. Sometimes it doesn't. It wastes my time and it sucks.

3.Writing formulae is a whole lot harder. The cursor cannot easily be  placed on a cell directly adjacent  to the cell you are trying to write a formula for. That wastes my time and it sucks.

4. Opening files is a whole lot more clunky. It is probably 2 or 3 more clicks than in Office for Mac 2011 (which I had no complaints about). That sucks. I wish I could go back. 
5. With the latest update when you click "Save as" Excel now adds "Copy Of" to the front of the file name. That wastes my time and it sucks.

There are other issues too. But heck, I am meant to be working, not whinging.

Ditto Brother,

I never trashed my 2011 office for Mac version.  Is it possible to reactivate it and forget about 2016?

Jim, what do think?

Mike

I really did not like MS forcing me to upgrade for Excel 2011 to 2016. having done so I amn doubly resentful. Not only is it a whole lot more expensive but its is terrible. I am on a Mac and if MS think this is going to forces me back into Windows they are very mistaken. It merely confirms my original decision to leave Windows. Incidentally I have to have (not for much longer!) Win10 on my Mac (in Oracle VirtualBox) and as an OS it sucks. 

1. Auto-recover used to be in a folder of your choice. Now it is somewhere in the MS cloud. I couldn't find it and as soon as you aren't on line guess what ? No auto-recover. That sucks. I now have to remember to save every 5 minutes just like in the late 80's. That sucks. Two days ago I closed a file by mistake and lost 2 hours work. Auto-Recover, allegedly on, was wholly useless. That sucked.
2. What propelled me into this whinge is I am working on a big spreadsheet and trying to select big blocks of data. Dragging the cursor off the edge of the screen doesn't work properly any more. Sometimes it does. Sometimes it doesn't. It wastes my time and it sucks.

3.Writing formulae is a whole lot harder. The cursor cannot easily be  placed on a cell directly adjacent  to the cell you are trying to write a formula for. That wastes my time and it sucks.

4. Opening files is a whole lot more clunky. It is probably 2 or 3 more clicks than in Office for Mac 2011 (which I had no complaints about). That sucks. I wish I could go back. 
5. With the latest update when you click "Save as" Excel now adds "Copy Of" to the front of the file name. That wastes my time and it sucks.

There are other issues too. But heck, I am meant to be working, not whinging.