rnaturalearth
rnaturalearth finished its sp exit and is now optimising how the data actually arrives.
Comparison · Analytics
parameters vs writexl
A side-by-side editorial comparison of parameters and writexl — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
parameters vs writexl: at a glance
What is parameters?
easystats' parameters package absorbs one more model class every few weeks
parameters extracts and formats coefficients from an enormous range of R model objects, and its releases read as a running ledger of that range expanding — lavaan and lavaan.mi, survey, lcmm, glmmTMB, fixest, marginaleffects, ordinal. Recent versions ship roughly monthly with a mix of new support, new arguments, and fixes for label handling and standard errors. The most consequential recent change is behavioral: post-hoc standardization no longer standardizes the intercept, setting it and its inferential statistics to NA.
What is writexl?
writexl spent nine years refusing to do formatting, then shipped all of it in 2.0.0.
For most of its history writexl was a deliberately minimal wrapper: bump the vendored libxlsxwriter, handle NA and Date coercion correctly, support a list of data frames for multiple sheets, and nothing else. 2.0.0, released August 2026, changes that — near-full libxlsxwriter coverage, cell/worksheet/workbook formatting, cell comments, an `xl_cell_general` class carrying value, formula and hyperlink, a cell-by-cell refactor, libxlsxwriter 1.2.4, and memory-safety work. It landed the same day as 1.5.4, a typo fix on the old line.
parameters vs writexl: editorial side-by-side
parameters
0.0ANALYTICS
easystats' parameters package absorbs one more model class every few weeks
◆ Current state
parameters extracts and formats coefficients from an enormous range of R model objects, and its releases read as a running ledger of that range expanding — lavaan and lavaan.mi, survey, lcmm, glmmTMB, fixest, marginaleffects, ordinal. Recent versions ship roughly monthly with a mix of new support, new arguments, and fixes for label handling and standard errors. The most consequential recent change is behavioral: post-hoc standardization no longer standardizes the intercept, setting it and its inferential statistics to NA.
◆ Where it's heading
The package's job is to be the universal adapter for model output, so its roadmap is effectively set by what the R modelling ecosystem produces. Two threads are visible beyond coverage: getting standard errors right for awkward cases such as frailty terms and robust vcov matrices, and getting labels right when factors are converted on the fly or character variables appear in a formula. Interoperability inside easystats keeps tightening, with equivalence_test() gaining methods for modelbased objects.
◆ Prediction
Given the cadence, the next release will most likely add another model class alongside label and standard-error fixes rather than change how the package works.
writexl
6.3ANALYTICS
writexl spent nine years refusing to do formatting, then shipped all of it in 2.0.0.
◆ Current state
For most of its history writexl was a deliberately minimal wrapper: bump the vendored libxlsxwriter, handle NA and Date coercion correctly, support a list of data frames for multiple sheets, and nothing else. 2.0.0, released August 2026, changes that — near-full libxlsxwriter coverage, cell/worksheet/workbook formatting, cell comments, an `xl_cell_general` class carrying value, formula and hyperlink, a cell-by-cell refactor, libxlsxwriter 1.2.4, and memory-safety work. It landed the same day as 1.5.4, a typo fix on the old line.
◆ Where it's heading
The package has changed category. Its selling point was being the dependency-free, opinion-free way to get a data frame into xlsx; 2.0.0 makes it a formatting-capable writer that now compares itself against openxlsx2 in its own test suite. The cell-by-cell refactor is what made that possible and is also the largest structural change in the package's history. Note that a single contributor drove essentially all of it.
◆ Prediction
Expect follow-up releases fixing edge cases in the new formatting and comment APIs — the cell-by-cell rewrite is too large to land clean, and the 2.0.0 notes already mention an off-by-one in date columns.
Alternatives to parameters and writexl
Other Analytics products tracked by Sparkpulse, ranked by recent ship velocity. Each card links to a full editorial trajectory and lets you pivot into a head-to-head comparison with either parameters or writexl.
rgbif
rgbif is steadily pushing users off paged searching and onto real downloads.
rstanarm
rstanarm is community-maintained now, tracking Stan and lme4 rather than adding models.
taxa
taxa started a ground-up rewrite in 2021 and has published almost nothing since.
rotl
rotl's whole release history is keeping name matching honest against a moving taxonomy.
taxize
taxize spends its releases absorbing other people's API changes, one dead source at a time.
See all parameters alternatives → · See all writexl alternatives →
Recent activity from parameters and writexl
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 8d agowritexlwritexl 2.0.0 adds formatting, comments and full libxlsxwriter coverage ⚡
- 8d agowritexlwritexl 1.5.4 fixes a documentation typo
- 1mo agoparametersparameters 0.29.2 extends lavaan support and fixes label dropping
- 2mo agoparametersparameters 0.29.1 adds a cluster argument and fixes vcov handling
- 3mo agoparametersparameters 0.29.0 stops standardizing the intercept in post-hoc methods
- 8mo agoparametersparameters 0.28.3 adds Kenward-Roger and Satterthwaite for glmmTMB
- 11mo agoparametersparameters 0.28.2 updates tests for the latest fixest release
- 11mo agoparametersparameters 0.28.1 adds robust standard errors for glmmTMB
- 5y agowritexlwritexl 1.4.0 updates libxlsxwriter to 1.0.3
- 6y agowritexlwritexl 1.2 fixes NA in formulas and hyperlinks
- 7y agowritexlwritexl 1.1 fixes NA strings and bit64 coercion
- 8y agowritexlwritexl 1.0 writes Date values as datetimes
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between parameters and writexl?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. writexl is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 6.3 vs 0.0), with 1 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. See the at-a-glance table above for a side-by-side breakdown of velocity, recent sparks, and editorial themes.
Is parameters better than writexl?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. writexl is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 6.3 vs 0.0), with 1 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. For your specific use case, the alternatives sections above list other Analytics products to evaluate alongside.
What are the best alternatives to parameters?
Top parameters alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "parameters alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/parameters-r for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to writexl?
Top writexl alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "writexl alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/writexl for the full list with editorial commentary on each.