Getting stock data into Excel makes it much easier to track stocks, build investment models, compare companies, and manage your portfolio without jumping between websites.

But there are several ways to get stock data in Excel.

You can use Excel’s built-in Stocks data type, the STOCKHISTORY function, Power Query, APIs, or an add-in like Wisesheets. Each method works differently, and the best choice depends on the type of stock data you need.

In this guide, we’ll compare the best ways to get live and historical stock data in Excel, including prices, fundamentals, dividends, financial statements, and key metrics.

Quick Answer: What is the Best Way to Get Stock Data in Excel?

The easiest ways to get stock data in Excel are Excel’s Stocks data type, the STOCKHISTORY function, Power Query, APIs, and add-ins like Wisesheets.

Excel’s built-in tools work well for basic stock prices and simple historical data. However, they are limited if you need deeper data like financial statements, key metrics, dividend history, valuation inputs, and global stock coverage.

Wisesheets is better if you want to pull live prices, historical prices, income statements, balance sheets, cash flow statements, key metrics, dividends, and global stock data directly into the same spreadsheet without coding or copy-pasting.

Best Ways to Get Stock Data in Excel

Method	Best For	Live Prices	Historical Prices	Fundamentals	Coding Needed
Excel Stocks data type	Basic stock fields	Yes	Limited	Limited	No
STOCKHISTORY	Historical prices	No	Yes	No	No
Power Query	Importing web data	Depends	Depends	Depends	Light technical
APIs	Custom workflows	Yes	Yes	Depends	Yes
Wisesheets	Live prices, historical data, dividends, financials, and metrics	Yes	Yes	Yes	No

Common Excel Stock Data Formulas

Goal	Formula
Live stock price	=WISEPRICE("AAPL","Price")
Historical close prices	=WISEPRICE("AAPL","Close",30)
Historical close prices by date range	=WISEPRICE("AAPL","Close",,"2024-01-01","2024-12-31")
Excel historical prices	=STOCKHISTORY("AAPL","2024-01-01",TODAY())
Revenue or fundamentals	=WISE("AAPL","Revenue",2024)
Dividend yield	`=WISE("AAPL","dividend yie

Why Getting Stock Data in Excel is Useful

Excel is one of the most useful tools for stock analysis because it gives you full control over your data.

Once your stock data is in a spreadsheet, you can create:

• Portfolio trackers
• DCF valuation models
• Dividend income trackers
• Stock dashboards
• Financial statement models
• Historical return models
• Screener-style templates
• Watchlists and alerts

This is useful because stock analysis usually requires more than a current share price.

You may need historical prices, revenue, earnings, free cash flow, dividend yield, valuation ratios, growth metrics, and other data points. Having that information within Excel makes it easier to compare companies, update models, and make better investment decisions.

How to Get Live Stock Prices in Excel

There are two simple ways to get live stock prices in Excel:

1. Excel’s Stocks data type
2. Wisesheets

Both can pull stock prices into your spreadsheet, but they are built for different use cases.

For a deeper walkthrough of live quote methods, read our guide on how to get real-time stock quotes in Excel.

Excel’s Stocks data type is useful for basic fields like price, market cap, P/E, volume, and exchange. Wisesheets is better if you need live stock prices alongside fundamentals, dividends, key metrics, and global stock data.

Option 1: Use Excel's Stock Data Type

Excel’s Stocks data type lets Microsoft 365 users pull basic stock information into Excel.

To use it:

1. Enter a list of ticker symbols in Excel.
2. Select the cells with those ticker symbols.
3. Go to the Data tab.
4. Click Stocks.
5. Excel will convert the tickers into stock data types.
6. Click the small data icon to add fields like price, market cap, P/E, volume, and more.

Excel’s Stocks data type can be useful if you only need basic data.

Some of the available fields include:

• Price
• Previous close
• Open
• High
• Low
• Market cap
• P/E
• Volume
• Exchange
• Company name
• Industry
• Currency
• Employees
• Shares outstanding

The main limitation is that Excel’s built-in stock data is not designed for complete investment analysis. It does not provide full historical financial statements, long-term fundamentals, key metrics history, or complete dividend history.

Option 2: Use Wisesheets for Live Stock Prices

Wisesheets lets you pull live stock prices directly into Excel using the WISEPRICE function.

The basic formula looks like this:

=WISEPRICE("GOOGL","Price")

This pulls Google's latest available stock price into your spreadsheet.

You can also pull other live stock data points, including:

• Price
• Market cap
• Volume
• Previous close
• Open
• Day high
• Day low
• Year high
• Year low
• P/E
• EPS
• Shares outstanding

For example, you can pull Google's price, market cap, volume, and P/E into Excel without manually searching for each data point.

Wisesheets supports 50+ global exchanges, including:

• NYSE
• NASDAQ
• TSX
• NSE
• LSE
• ASX
• HKSE
• SIX
• XETRA
• EURONEXT
• OSE

This can come in very handy if you need stock data for companies outside the US or if you want to analyze global stocks in the same spreadsheet.

How to Get Historical Stock Data in Excel

If you want historical stock prices in Excel, you can use either:

1. Excel’s STOCKHISTORY function
2. Wisesheets’ WISEPRICE function

Both can pull historical prices, but are not exactly the same.

STOCKHISTORY is useful for simple historical price and volume data.

WISEPRICE is better if you need more historical parameters, global coverage, dividends, adjusted close prices, volume, VWAP, or flexible date ranges.

Option 1: Use Excel's STOCKHISTORY Function

Excel’s STOCKHISTORY function pulls historical stock prices directly into your spreadsheet.

The basic formula looks like this:

=STOCKHISTORY("AAPL",DATE(2026,5,1),DATE(2026,6,3))

This returns Apple’s historical stock prices from May 1, 2026 to June 3, 2026.

The full syntax is:

=STOCKHISTORY(stock, start_date, [end_date], [interval], [headers], [property0], [property1], [property2], [property3], [property4], [property5])

This is what the main arguments mean:

Argument	What It Does
stock	The ticker or stock identifier
start_date	The first date for the historical data
end_date	The final date for the historical data
interval	Daily, weekly, or monthly data
headers	Whether Excel should return column headers
properties	The fields you want, such as close, open, high, low, or volume

The available properties include:

Property	Definition
Date	First valid trading day in the period
Close	Closing price
Open	Opening price
High	Highest price
Low	Lowest price
Volume	Volume traded

STOCKHISTORY is a good option if you only need simple historical prices.

However, it does not provide financial statements, key metrics, dividend history, valuation data, or company fundamentals.

For a more detailed tutorial, see our step-by-step guide to the STOCKHISTORY function in Excel.

Option 2: Use Wisesheets for Historical Stock Prices

ax works like this:

=WISEPRICE("ticker","parameter","number of days","start date","end date")

For example, if you want Apple’s closing prices for the last 30 business days, you can use:

=WISEPRICE("AAPL","Close",30)

If you want historical close prices for a specific date range, you can use:

=WISEPRICE("AAPL","Close",,"2024-01-01","2024-12-31")

This gives you greater control when you want data for a specific historical period.

Wisesheets supports historical parameters such as:

• Open
• High
• Low
• Close
• AdjClose
• Volume
• Unadjusted Volume
• Change
• Change Percent
• VWAP
• Change Over Time

This is useful if you are building dashboards, backtests, portfolio trackers, or valuation models that need more than just closing prices.

You can also read our full guide on getting historical stock data in Excel.

How to Pull Financial Statements and Metrics into Excel

Excel’s built-in Stocks data type and STOCKHISTORY function do not provide full historical financial statements.

That means Excel’s native stock tools cannot pull complete company fundamentals such as:

• Revenue
• Gross profit
• Operating income
• Net income
• EPS
• Free cash flow
• Total assets
• Total liabilities
• Debt
• ROIC
• Margins
• Growth metrics

With Wisesheets, you can pull this data into Excel in two ways:

1. Data Dump
2. WISE function

Option 1: Use the Wisesheets Data Dump

The Data Dump feature lets you enter a ticker, choose annual or quarterly data, and pull the company’s financial statements and key metrics into your spreadsheet.

This is useful when you want a full dataset quickly, including:

• Income statement
• Balance sheet
• Cash flow statement
• Key metrics
• Growth metrics

You can pull everything into Excel at once, avoiding the need to copy financials from multiple websites.

This is especially helpful when you are analyzing several companies or building a model that needs multiple years of financial data.

Option 2: Use the WISE Function

The WISE function is better when you want specific financial data points for a model.

The formula looks like this:

=WISE("AAPL","Revenue",2024)

You can also pull trailing twelve months data:

=WISE("AAPL","Revenue","ttm")

The WISE function is useful for building models where you only need selected metrics, such as revenue, EPS, free cash flow, gross margin, operating income, or dividend yield.

Once your model is set up, you can change the ticker and update the entire spreadsheet without rebuilding it from scratch.

How to Get Dividend Data in Excel

Excel’s built-in stock tools do not provide complete dividend history.

With Wisesheets, you can pull both current and historical dividend data into Excel.

To get the current dividend yield, use:

=WISE("AAPL","dividend yield","ttm")

To get all historical dividend payments, use:

=WISEPRICE("AAPL","dividend")

To get dividend payments for a specific year, use:

=WISE("AAPL","dividend",2024)

This is useful if you are building:

• Dividend trackers
• Passive income dashboards
• Dividend growth models
• Portfolio income projections
• Stock comparison sheets

Dividend data is essential if you analyze income stocks, ETFs, REITs, or long-term portfolio holdings.

If dividends are a major part of your strategy, you can also use our dividend tracker spreadsheet to monitor income across your portfolio.

Wisesheets vs. Excel Stocks: Which Should You Use?

Excel’s built-in stock tools are useful, but they are limited. Wisesheets is better if you want a more complete stock analysis workflow inside Excel.

Feature	Excel Stocks / STOCKHISTORY	Wisesheets
Basic stock prices	Yes	Yes
Historical prices	Yes	Yes
Live prices	Yes, but limited	Yes
Financial statements	No	Yes
Key metrics	Limited	Yes
Dividend history	No	Yes
Global exchange coverage	Limited	Yes
Formula-based modeling	Limited	Yes
No coding required	Yes	Yes

The best approach for many investors is to use both. Use Excel’s built-in tools for quick price checks and simple historical data, and Wisesheets when you need deeper stock analysis, including financial statements, key metrics, dividends, and global market data.

Which Excel Stock Data Method Should You Use?

Here’s the simplest way to decide:

Your Goal	Best Method
Get a basic live stock price	Excel Stocks or Wisesheets
Get simple historical prices	STOCKHISTORY
Get historical prices with more parameters	Wisesheets
Pull income statements into Excel	Wisesheets
Pull balance sheets into Excel	Wisesheets
Pull cash flow statements into Excel	Wisesheets
Get dividend history	Wisesheets
Build a valuation model	Wisesheets
Import data from a specific website	Power Query
Build a custom workflow with your own data source	API

If you only need simple prices, Excel’s built-in tools may be enough. For investment-grade data inside Excel, Wisesheets is the better option.

If your goal is deeper company research, our guide to stock analysis in Excel shows how to turn raw data into a more complete investment workflow.

Advanced Uses of Stock Data in Excel

Once you can pull live and historical stock data into Excel, you can build much more useful spreadsheets.

Build a DCF Valuation Model in Excel

A discounted cash flow model helps estimate the intrinsic value of a stock based on future cash flows.

To build one properly, you usually need:

• Revenue
• Operating income
• Free cash flow
• Margins
• Growth assumptions
• Discount rate
• Terminal value
• Shares outstanding

Wisesheets can help by pulling the financial statement data directly into Excel. This saves time and reduces manual copy-paste errors.

Create Financial Statement Trend Charts

You can also use Wisesheets data with Excel sparklines to visualize trends in:

• Revenue
• EPS
• Free cash flow
• Gross margin
• Operating margin
• Debt
• ROIC

This makes it easier to spot long-term improvements or deterioration in a company’s fundamentals.

Build a Portfolio Tracker in Excel

A portfolio tracker can help you monitor:

• Live portfolio value
• Daily gains or losses
• Allocation by stock
• Allocation by sector
• Dividend income
• Portfolio returns
• Historical performance

You can use WISEPRICE for live prices, WISE for fundamentals, and STOCKHISTORY for simple historical price ranges.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the easiest way to get stock data in Excel?

The easiest way depends on the type of data you need. Excel’s Stocks data type works for basic stock prices, while STOCKHISTORY is useful for historical prices. If you need live prices, financial statements, dividends, key metrics, and global stock data, Wisesheets is the more complete option.

How do I get live stock prices in Excel?

You can get live stock prices in Excel using Excel’s Stocks data type or Wisesheets. With Wisesheets, you can use:

=WISEPRICE("AAPL","Price")

This pulls the latest available Apple stock price directly into your spreadsheet.

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How do I get historical stock prices in Excel?

You can use Excel’s STOCKHISTORY function:

=STOCKHISTORY("AAPL","2024-01-01",TODAY())

You can also use Wisesheets:

=WISEPRICE("AAPL","Close",30)

For a specific date range, use:

=WISEPRICE("AAPL","Close",,"2024-01-01","2024-12-31")

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What is the difference between STOCKHISTORY and WISEPRICE?

STOCKHISTORY is Excel’s built-in function for historical price and volume data. WISEPRICE can pull live prices, historical prices, dividends, adjusted close, VWAP, volume, and other stock price data across 50+ global exchanges.

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Can Excel pull financial statements?

Excel’s built-in stock tools do not pull full financial statements. To get income statements, balance sheets, cash flow statements, and key metrics in Excel, you need a tool like Wisesheets.

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Can I get dividend data in Excel?

Yes, but not through Excel’s built-in stock tools. With Wisesheets, you can pull current dividend yield using:

=WISE("AAPL","dividend yield","ttm")

You can also pull historical dividend payments using:

=WISEPRICE("AAPL","dividend")

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Does Wisesheets work with global stocks?

Yes. Wisesheets supports 50+ global exchanges, including major exchanges in the US, Canada, Europe, the UK, India, Australia, Hong Kong, and more.

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Is Wisesheets better than Excel Stocks?

Wisesheets is better if you need full stock analysis inside Excel. Excel Stocks is useful for basic stock fields, while Wisesheets gives you live prices, historical prices, financial statements, key metrics, dividends, and global stock data.

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Can I use Excel and Wisesheets together?

Yes. You can use Excel’s built-in tools for simple stock price data and Wisesheets for deeper analysis, including financial statements, dividends, and key metrics.

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Can I build a stock portfolio tracker in Excel?

Yes. You can build a portfolio tracker in Excel using live prices, historical prices, and portfolio formulas. WISEPRICE can help with live prices, STOCKHISTORY can help with historical prices, and WISE can help with fundamentals and metrics.

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Does Excel update stock data automatically?

Excel’s stock data can update, but the refresh behavior depends on the tool you use. Excel’s Stocks data type can refresh stock fields, while Wisesheets lets you refresh live prices, financial data, metrics, and dividends inside your spreadsheet.

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Is Wisesheets worth paying for if Excel has free stock data?

Yes, if you do serious stock analysis. Excel’s built-in stock tools are useful for basic prices and simple historical data, but Wisesheets is better for fundamentals, dividend history, key metrics, financial statements, and broader global stock coverage.

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Conclusion: Choose the Right Excel Stock Data Setup

Excel gives investors a flexible way to work with stock data, but the best method depends on what you need.

If you only want basic stock prices, Excel’s Stocks data type may be enough. If you want historical price data, STOCKHISTORY is a useful built-in option. But if you want live prices, financial statements, key metrics, dividends, and global stock data in one spreadsheet, Wisesheets gives you a much more complete setup.

The best approach is to use the right tool for the job.

Use Excel’s native features for simple stock data. Turn to Wisesheets when you need deeper analysis, cleaner models, and less manual copy-pasting.

If you want to pull live prices, historical data, financial statements, key metrics, and dividends into Excel without building everything manually, you can try Wisesheets and start working with complete stock data directly inside your spreadsheet.