Problem with excel file size

Excel often allows you more than one way of achieving a result. Some are more efficient than others, but this difference does not show up until you have spreadsheets with "complex" computations and lots of data. By tweaking your calculations you may be able to resume using the data as it is. I have a large collection of articles with tips on how to optimize spreadsheets. Of course many of the tips are repeated in multiple articles.

Here is a wiki with those links:. Most people are using 1 of 3 Office versions: , or I will provide simple guidelines on how to quickly identify which version of Office you are running. The table provides a list of the version and build numbers for each update channel release. The table is ordered by release date, with the most recent release date listed first. To see this information organized by version number, refer to the table that follows this one.

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Any image, link, or discussion related to child pornography, child nudity, or other child abuse or exploitation. Details required : characters remaining Cancel Submit. I do have many rows, columns, calculations and formulas but i cant believe it is any more than the average excel user.

The biggest problem when you say open and delete data is the fact the file just wont open. Follow steps below to show and delete unnecessary hidden worksheets. To unhide hidden worksheets right-click on a Worksheet and select Unhide :. To delete an unused Worksheet right-click and select Delete :. Formatting adds additional kilobytes to your Excel file size. To remove cell formatting you can read this MSDN article or follow below:.

Select Cells for which you want to remove formats. Look for the Editing section in the Home ribbon and select Clear Formats :. Another reason for Excel to have an unreasonable file size is due to media, especially Images. Although you may think cropping and Image and resizing reduce its size, in fact Excel still keeps the entire image in memory. Out of curiosity, did your data have a lot of formatting, borders or highlighting? That information may have been contributing to the initial large file size.

Just go for PIVOT and take data from there selecting any of the field double click on the numbers you will get a sheet open copy and paste in any other excel sheet it will redue like 9 mb file into some KB. Hi Chris, I have a 3 sheets containing the inquiry, order, billing details of customers for months which runs into rows and 30 — 40 columns. I have this data in tables. The file size is 11 mb due to pivot tables and other formulae. How can i reduce the file size without affecting the formulae.

I tried saving the file in binary format but file reduced to 9 mb. Otherwise, you might want to consider splitting the data and the PivotTables into separate Excel files. The PivotTables can still refer to data that is in another file, but you will need to have both files open to make it update.

If I delete the rows from the bottom of my data row 84 down to row 1,, and press Ctrl and End again, I still end up in cell T! For some reason, this is not working for me…I have Office Microsoft Office on a 64bit desktop.

I have a 44 MB Application that I am trying to reduce in size. I have selected the bottom portion of a worksheets, as described here. At first I deleted, then I cleared contents, then I cleared all… My blank cell range keeps enlarging!!!

It started at row and I am now at row What can I do? No conditional formatting, no formulas going to the bottom of the columns, etc. The sheet is 31MB as an. Only by turning off calc and using F9 will it function. It was working fine for weeks, then overnight after no significant additions, it became slow as molasses.

Thanks very much! My excel work book file was MB. A great combination of methods to get the file size down. I wonder what the size would be if you saved the Excel Workbook as a binary file.

This is excellent! Thanks for the article. Great advice. If you use named ranges and duplicate a tab, the named range also duplicates, but only for that worksheet rather than the whole workbook.

It can also get messy when using legacy files or tailoring an existing file that may have old name references in it. Thanks so much! It was a file I received from a coworker, so I had no idea why it was so large or how to fix it. Thank you! I used to be able to use the ctrl shift down arrow option to go to the bottom of the sheet in order to delete extra rows and ctrl shift right arrow to get to the last column and delete them too.

The down arrow just takes me to the next row and the right arrow jumps a few columns but never gets to the rightmost column. And ctrl end remains inside of cells that have been background filled, not go to the lowest rightmost used cell. Can anyone say what has happened? Try pressing the End button on your keyboard to get out of it. Let me know how you go! Thanks for the info. I used it to clean up a spreadsheet that had multiple sheets and had grown to After cleaning up, it shrunk to 2.

I have not used binary worksheets, but tried that and file reduced to 1. Love finding stuff like this and appreciate you sharing. Hi Chris, Thanks a lot for your great tips. Hi Chris, We often get extremely large Excel files due to the used range. Do you have any advice for this? Hi Donovan, my first suggestion is to try deleting a handful of rows or columns at a time. Excel might not want to do all of them at once, but breaking it up into 5 or 6 separate delete actions might help!

Right-click and select Delete. Thank you! Any more feedback? The more you tell us the more we can help. Can you help us improve? Resolved my issue. Clear instructions. Easy to follow. No jargon.

Pictures helped. Didn't match my screen. Incorrect instructions. Too technical. Not enough information. Not enough pictures.