rnaturalearth
rnaturalearth finished its sp exit and is now optimising how the data actually arrives.
Comparison · Analytics
see vs writexl
A side-by-side editorial comparison of see and writexl — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
see vs writexl: at a glance
What is see?
see grows wherever easystats adds a diagnostic, one plot method at a time.
see is the visualization layer for the easystats ecosystem, supplying plot() methods for performance, parameters and datawizard objects. Each release adds methods for whatever those packages shipped — prior predictive checks, DAG diagrams, factor-analysis graphs — alongside steady theme and geom refinement.
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.
see vs writexl: editorial side-by-side
see
0.0ANALYTICS
see grows wherever easystats adds a diagnostic, one plot method at a time.
◆ Current state
see is the visualization layer for the easystats ecosystem, supplying plot() methods for performance, parameters and datawizard objects. Each release adds methods for whatever those packages shipped — prior predictive checks, DAG diagrams, factor-analysis graphs — alongside steady theme and geom refinement.
◆ Where it's heading
Growth here is downstream-driven rather than self-directed: see expands to cover new diagnostics as easystats produces them. Running alongside that is a sustained investment in presentation control — theme arguments on plot methods, elements that scale with base_size — which suits users embedding these plots in documents rather than glancing at them interactively.
◆ Prediction
Expect new plot methods to keep arriving in step with performance and parameters releases, with continued theming work rather than any change in the package's scope.
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 see 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 see 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.
Recent activity from see 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 agoseesee 0.14.1 adds plots for prior checks and grouped means
- 2mo agoseesee 0.14.0 renders factor loadings as node-edge graphs
- 6mo agoseesee 0.13.0 fixes reversed plot sorting, adds theme arguments
- 11mo agoseesee 0.12.0 extends normality checks to psych factor models
- 1y agoseesee 0.11.0 scales theme elements with base_size
- 1y agoseesee 0.10.0 plots random-effect group levels for mixed models
- 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 see 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 see 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 see?
Top see alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "see alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/see-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.