Help

Launch Nought and open any .xlsx, .xlsm, .ods or .csv file. Or start with a blank workbook.

Click a cell or use the arrow keys. Start typing to replace the contents. Press ↩ to commit and move down, ⇥ to commit and move right.

Type = then a function name. Autocomplete suggests matching functions as you type; click one to insert it. Or click the fx button in the formula bar to pick a function and fill in its arguments in a guided panel.

Use the toolbar for bold, italic, colours, borders and number formats. Select cells first, then apply formatting.

⌘Ssaves in the original format; if the file contains something Nought cannot write back, it tells you before overwriting. Use File > Export as PDF (⇧⌘E) for a printable version with charts, or right-click a chart to export it on its own as PNG or SVG.

Select a cell and type = followed by your formula, then press ↩. Autocomplete shows matching function names as you type. You can also click the fx button in the formula bar to browse and search the function library by category.

Select a data range, then click Insert in the toolbar and choose Chart. Pick a chart type in the dialog and click Insert. Charts can be moved, resized and edited after insertion.

Select the cell just below the rows and just right of the columns you want frozen, then open the Data menu in the toolbar (the up/down arrows) and choose Freeze Panes. You can also right-click a column header. Choose Unfreeze Panes from the same menu to release it.

To sort, select the range first, then use the Data menu in the menu bar: Sort Ascending, Sort Descending, or Custom Sort for a multi-level sort by values, colour, dates, or a custom list. Each menu item shows the range it will act on. The same commands are in the toolbar’s Data menu (the up/down arrows).

To filter, click the funnel button in the toolbar to turn on AutoFilter, then use the dropdown arrow on any column header to filter by values or by a condition (contains, equals, greater than, between), with a search box and multi-select.

Nought reads and writes .xlsx and .xlsm (Excel, including macro-enabled), .ods (OpenDocument) and .csv files. It exports to PDF, and any chart to PNG or SVG. When you open a .xlsxfile, Nought edits it in place and saves it back — no import or export step needed.

Nought works out a CSV’s encoding from its contents, which matters because a .csv carries no record of how it was written. UTF-8 and UTF-16 are recognised from their byte order mark or their shape; beyond those it recognises the Windows and ISO code pages, including Hebrew and Arabic, which before 1.0.33 it could not read at all and which came through as nonsense.

If a file still opens as the wrong characters, it is a code page nothing here covers. Send it to hello@nought.app: a file that opens correctly somewhere else and not in Nought is the only thing that fixes this properly.

Settings > Formats sets which format the save panel offers first for a new spreadsheet — .xlsx or .ods. It does not change existing files: open an .xlsx and save it and it stays .xlsx, because a workbook quietly changing type would be worse than the setting is useful.

Nought caps how much of a very large sheet it will hold in memory, so a file with an enormous stated range cannot exhaust it. If a workbook is too big to open completely, Nought says so on opening and names what it could not show.

A workbook in that state will not save over its original, because what is in memory is only part of it. Use File > Save As to write what you can see to a new file, and your original stays whole.

Nought preserves formatting, formulas, charts, conditional formatting, data validations, merged cells, frozen panes, pivot tables and sheet structure when opening .xlsx files. Macro-enabled workbooks (.xlsm, .xltm) open too: Nought does not run VBA, but the macro code is kept unchanged when you save back as .xlsm. Power Query is not yet supported, and Nought warns you before a save would drop anything it cannot write back.

By default Nought follows your system appearance, but you can override it in Settings > General > Appearance and choose Follow System, Light, or Dark.

Where you left it. Move the window, resize it and quit, and it comes back at that size in that place rather than at whatever size macOS picks.

In Settings > General > On launch, choose Reopen last document. You can also start with a blank spreadsheet or show the Open dialog.

No. Everything runs locally on your Mac. There is no account, no login, no sync and no telemetry. The only traffic Nought is involved in is Apple’s own purchase check, made by the system when you open the Licence tab or buy.

Nought is free to download and fully functional for 14 days. After that it becomes read only until you buy it: your files still open, scroll and print, but editing and saving stop. The purchase is $9.99 once, not a subscription, and it is yours for good. Anyone who had Nought before version 1.0.28 keeps it free permanently.

macOS 14 (Sonoma) or later. Nought is a universal binary: native on Apple Silicon (M1 through M4) and on Intel Macs.

Yes. Nought is code-signed with a Developer ID certificate and notarised by Apple. It launches without any Gatekeeper warnings.

Use the feedback form, or email hello@nought.app. Every piece of feedback is read and shapes what gets built next.

For a bug report it helps to include your macOS version, the Nought version (Nought > About Nought), a diagnostics file (Help > Save Diagnostics), and the file you were working with if you can share it.

See also what’s new, the feature list, and the privacy policy.