And the winner is…you! Use the Oscars Ballot Predictor

Don't have time to watch all the Oscar-nominated movies, but want the inside scoop on the likely winners? Try the new Oscars Ballot Predictor app, which brings a bit of Hollywood fun to Excel 2013 and gives you a competitive edge at your Oscars party.

The interactive app lets you see the Oscar nominees, vote for your picks, and check out the predicted winners in each of the 24 categories. Your selections are recorded on a printable ballot sheet that you can take to your Oscars party to compare with your friends' choices and see how your odds stack up.

The Ballot Predictor is an Excel app that uses predictive modeling from PredictWise.com to estimate the nominees' chances of winning. The Excel workbook features the following three worksheets:

• The Oscars worksheet displays the categories with each nominee represented by a star. Select a category to see the nominees. The size of the star correlates to that nominee's chances of winning: the larger the star, the greater likelihood of winning. To make your picks, click a star in each category. Your choices will be highlighted in red. Hover your cursor over a star to see the precise percentage chance of winning.

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• The second worksheet, labeled Ballot, is your printable ballot, displaying your picks in red and the likely winners in black.

• Sure, you may like your picks best of all, but do they have a realistic chance of winning? Click the third worksheet, labeled Data, to see. Here you can see the percentage likelihood of winning for each nominee. Use the Excel data sorting and filtering features to display the data however you like.

The Oscars Ballot Predictor is one of several new apps available in the Office Apps Store that express Excel data in ways that are both entertaining and useful. Explore the Office Store to find more apps for Excel 2013 that can make your work easier, increase your productivity, and help you have fun.