Excel Services in SharePoint and Excel Web App (in Office Web Apps) in SharePoint 2013

Excel Services in SharePoint

Excel Services is technology that enables you to view and interact with a workbook in a browser window similar to how you would use Excel on your computer.

Excel uses a built-in calculation engine to connect to external data and render the results of formulas and queries.

Excel Services uses server technology to provide similar functionality in a browser window.

Excel Services was introduced in Office SharePoint Server 2007.

In SharePoint Server 2013, Excel Services is available only in the Enterprise edition.

Excel Web App in Office Web Apps

Excel Services technology is available in Office Web Apps Server as Excel Web App, and in SharePoint as Excel Services.

Excel Web App and Excel Services in SharePoint have a lot in common, but they are not the same.

Both applications enable you to view workbooks in a browser window, and both enable you to interact with and explore data.

However, there are certain differences between Excel Web App and Excel Services in SharePoint.

Excel Services supports external data connections, data models, and the ability to interact with items that use data models (such as PivotChart reports, PivotTable reports and timeline controls).

Excel Web App enables users to view and interact with workbooks, but Excel Web App does not support external data connections or the ability to interact with reports and timeline controls that use data models.

Excel Services provides more business intelligence functionality than Excel Web App, but Excel Services does not enable users to create or edit workbooks in a browser window.

Excel Services is available only in the Enterprise edition of SharePoint Server 2013. Excel Web App is available in SharePoint Server 2013 and SharePoint Foundation 2013.

If your organization decides to use Excel Services instead of Excel Web App to view workbooks in the browser, you can use the Windows PowerShell New-SPWOPISuppressionSettings cmdlet to turn off Excel Web App for Excel workbooks. I have posted on that here.

Excel Services (part of SharePoint Server 2013) and Excel Web App (part of Office Web Apps Server) enable you and others to view and interact with a workbook in a browser window similar to how you would use Excel 2013 on your computer. In your environment, you might be using either Excel Services or Excel Web App, but not both at the same time. A SharePoint administrator determines which application is used to display workbooks in a browser window.

How to determine whether you are using Excel Web App or Excel Services.

One good way to determine whether Excel Services or Excel Web App is used to render a workbook is to examine the website address (URL) for the workbook.

1. Look for xlviewer in the URL

If the URL resembles               

“http://[servername]_layouts/15/xlviewer.aspx?id=/Documents/...” then Excel Services is used to render the workbook.

2. Look for WopiFrame in the URL

If the URL resembles 

“http://[servername]/_layouts/15/WopiFrame2.aspx?sourcedoc=/Documents/...”          

then Excel Web App is used to render the workbook.

 Reference: 1 , 2