DataNumen Excel Repair

How to repair a corrupt EXCEL workbook for free?

Yes, Microsoft Office Excel has a built-in function that can repair a corrupt Excel file. Whenever it detects corruptions in your file, it will start File Recovery mode and try to repair your file. However, sometimes, the File Recovery mode will not be started automatically, or you may want to repair your file manually. In such cases, please do as below:

Note: Before repairing your corrupt workbook, try to copy it to a local hard disk if it is stored on a network drive.

1. Open MS Excel.
2. Select File > Open > Browse.
3. In the Open file dialog, browse to find the Excel file to be repaired.
4. Do NOT double-click the file, as that will try to open the file directly instead of repairing it. Instead, you should single-click the file.
5. Then click the arrow beside the Open button, you will see a drop-down list of open methods.
6. Click Open and Repair…
7. A dialog box will pop up saying “Excel can perform checks while opening the workbook and attempt to repair any corruption it detects, or extract just the data (formulas and values) from the workbook.”
8. To maximize data recovery, click the Repair button.
9. If step 8 fails, then you should repeat steps 2 to 7, and click the Extract Data button.
10. If the Repair or Extract Data process succeeds, Excel will output the recovered data into a new file called xxx [Repaired].xlsx, where xxx is the name of the corrupt workbook file name. You can click File > Save As to save the fixed file to another name or location.

You can also import the data of a corrupt workbook via external references, as below:

1. Assuming your corrupt workbook is called Book1.xlsx.
2. Open Excel.
3. Create a blank workbook and save it as Book2.xlsx, in the same directory as Book1.xlsx.
4. In Book2.xlsx, in Sheet1/cell A1, input the formula =[Book1.xlsx]Sheet1!A1, then press Enter.
5. If the data in cell A1 of Book1/Sheet1 can be recovered and imported, then it will appear in call A1 of Book2/Sheet1.
6. Now we can apply the formula to all other cells.
7. Select cell A1 in Book2/Sheet1.
8. Press Ctrl + C.
9. Select a range that is larger than the one in Book1, so that all the data in Book1 can be imported.
10. Right-click the mouse, and in the pop-up menu, you can see there is a list of options under Paste Options, select Formulas as the paste option.
11. Thus you will see all the data in Book1 are imported.
12. However, the imported data are still linked to Book1. Now we need to break the links and keep the values only.
13. Select a range that covers all the cells having a value.
14. Press Ctrl + C.
15.  Right-click the mouse, and in the pop-up menu, select Values as the paste option.
16. Nothing happens. However, when you click one of the cells, such as cell A1, you can find the formula is replaced with the value.

You can also use a macro to extract the data from the corrupt Excel workbook.

If the above method does not work, your file is badly damaged. You should use a professional Excel data recovery tool to do the task.

Which versions of EXCEL are supported?

Currently, Microsoft Excel version 3, 4, 5, 95, 97, 2000, XP, 2003, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019 and Excel for Office 365 are supported. Both xls and xlsx file formats are supported.

What are the “DNDEFAULTSHEET#” SHEETS In the recovered workbook?

Our file repair tool will try to recover the name and data of an Excel sheet. However, sometimes due to data corruption, the name cannot be recovered, but the data can. In such a case, we will set the recovered worksheet name to “DNDefaultSheet#” arbitrarily and save the recovered data into it, where # is a sequence number of the worksheet, starting from 1.

DO I NEED TO HAVE EXCEL on my computer to run your APP?

Yes, you need to have Excel installed on your computer to run our repair tool. Before repairing a damaged Excel document, if our tool detects that there are no Excel installed, then it will pop-up an error message and abort the data recovery process.

Need I close Microsoft EXCEL during the repair process?

Yes, we recommend you to do so.

During the repair process, sometimes you will notice that Microsoft Excel will be opened and closed in the background automatically. That is normal, as our repair software will invoke some functions in Microsoft Excel to perform the necessary tasks.

Do you support FILES CREATED BY EXCEL for Mac?

Yes, but you need to have a Windows/PC system to perform the recovery, as below:

1. Copy the corrupt MS Excel file from Mac to PC.
2. Repair the corrupt Excel file with our file recovery tool and generate a new fixed Excel file.
3. Copy the fixed Excel file from PC back to Mac.

NOTHING HAPPENS WHEN I DOUBLE-CLICK An EXCEL WORKBOOK. What SHOULD I DO?

First of all, you should diagnose the problem to determine whether the problem is caused by the file corruption, as follows:

1. Copy your Excel workbook to another computer with Excel installed.
2. Start Excel
3. Click File > Open > Browse
4. Select the Excel workbook and click the Open button.
5. If the workbook can be opened successfully, then it is not corrupt. Otherwise, it is corrupt and you can use “open and repair” method to  repair the corrupted workbook.

If the workbook is not corrupt, then it is Excel installed on your computer that causes the problem, please do as follows:

1. Try to launch Excel in safe mode and open the Excel workbook.
2. If everything is fine, then try to disable the Add-ins in your Excel one by one until you find the faulty one that causes the problem.
3. If Excel cannot be launched even in safe mode, then you need to repair the Microsoft Office installation and fix the corrupt installation files for MS Office Excel.

can you repair Excel MACRO-ENABLED workbook (XLSM) files?

Yes, however, our recovery software can only recover data, not the macros inside the .xlsm file. So the fixed file will be saved as .xlsx format instead.

MY EXCEL CRASHES BEFORE I SAVE MY WORKBOOK. CAN YOU RECOVER IT?

Excel has a built-in feature to recover unsaved workbooks, as follows:

1. Start the Excel.
2. Click File > Open
3. Select the Recent option. By default, it is already selected.
4. Then in the right panel, click the Recover Unsaved Workbooks button.
5. In the Open file dialog, find your wanted file and open it.
6. Click Save As to save the recovered file to your preferred name.

DO YOU SUPPORT TO RECOVER THE CONDITIONAL FORMATTING?

Sorry but currently we do not support to recover the conditional formatting. We have added it to our to-do list and will try to implement it in future versions. Please subscribe to our newsletter to get notifications whenever a new release is available.

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