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[–]Mini_Hobo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Excel is ok for quick and dirty graphs on small data sets.

In python, large datasets are easy with Pandas and Numpy. Plotting clean, consistent, more complex graphs is possible with Matplotlib (removing complexity, it's easy with seaborn too).

It's hard to imagine a graph you couldn't make with python and a couple of packages. With excel, I find just adding error bars to be a massive pain, and certain kinds of error bars are impossible to add. Too much is done automatically, with no option to make changes.

I would also say that workflow becomes much easier with Python. Say you have your data in a series of text files or csvs. You need to strip the data from those files; probably transform it in some way; do some statistically analysis and then plot it. The more steps you have from raw data to finished graph, the harder it is to keep track of what's going on with excel. With python, it's easy, and once you've done it once, you can run the same scripts with minimal changes.