Repairing corrupted files in Excel

- open blank work book
- go to open
- find the desired file & chose open & repair
- confirm by clicking Yes
 if excel can't open the file, choose extract data.
- if excel warns you that the file caused a serious error the last time it was opened agree to continue open it.
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Microsoft Excel provides automatic recovery for a corrupted file by attempting to reopen and simultaneously repair the file. Excel identifies what it changed while repairing the file. If the repair fails, Excel again tries to open the file but instead of attempting a repair, Excel extracts cell values and formulas leaving only the data. Under some circumstances, however, Excel won't automatically go into recovery mode, so users may find it necessary to recover file data manually.

To manually repair a file

1. On the File menu, click Open.
2. In the Open dialog box, select the file you want to open, and click the arrow next to the Open button.
3. Click Open and Repair, and then choose which method you want to use to recover your workbook.

Methods for recovering data from damaged workbooks

The following are additional methods you can use to recover data manually from a file that has been corrupted. Under some circumstances a disk error or network error may make it impossible to open a file. In those situations you should move your file to a different hard disk drive or from the network to a local disk before spending time implementing the recovery options outlined here.

The following methods are opportunities to save data that might otherwise be lost, so if one method is not successful, try another. You can also try third-party software solutions to recover file data if you can't recover your data using these methods.

If you can open the file in Excel

Use the Revert To Saved Document command

Save the file in SYLK format

Save the file in Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) format

If you can't open the file in Excel

Set the recalculation option in Excel to manual

Use external references to link to the corrupted file

Open the file in Microsoft Word or WordPad

Open the file in Microsoft Excel Viewer

If a chart is linked to the corrupted file, use a macro to extract the data

Saving a backup copy of your file

As a preventative measure, you may want to save your file often and create a backup copy every time you save. In the Save As dialog box (File menu, Save As command), click Tools, click General Options, and then select theAlways create backup check box. This way, you'll have access to a good copy of the file, should the original be accidentally deleted or become corrupted.

You can also make sure that Excel automatically creates a recovery file at specific intervals. In the Options dialog box (Tools menu, Options command), on the Save tab, select the Save AutoRecover info every check box, and then specify a number of minutes. In the AutoRecover save location box, specify the location where you want to save the recovery file. Make sure that the Disable AutoRecover check box (under Workbook options) is not selected.

More information

For more information about file recovery issues, see the product support articles listed under See Also, or go directly to the Excel 2003 Support Center.

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