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Make Excel worksheets available offline

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Hello, Office Insiders! My name is Hugo Garcia and I’m a Product Manager on the Office team. I’m excited to announce that you can now make Excel worksheets stored in the cloud available offline when using your iPhone or iPad.

Make Excel worksheets available offline

You can now have the best of both worlds: save your files to the cloud so your data is safe and available on all your devices, and choose which files you want to be able to access offline.

How it works

  1. Open Excel (or the Office app) on your iPhone or iPad.
  2. In the Home screen, tap the More Options menu (“…”) for the worksheet you want to be able to view or edit while offline.
  3. Tap the Make Available Offline option.

Excel File Settings with Make Available Offline option selected

Once the word Downloaded and a checkmark icon appear next to the file name, it is ready to be viewed and edited offline.

Excel files showing Downloaded status

Scenarios to try

  • To view all files that have been made available offline, go to Open > Other Storage Offline Files.

Excel Offline Files folder

  • Try putting your iPhone or iPad in Airplane mode and open any of your offline files.

Use Airplane Mode to test offline availability of your Excel files

NOTE: You can make files available offline in Word and PowerPoint as well as the Office app! Try it out!

Tips & tricks

  • By default, Excel only downloads files over Wi-Fi (to avoid accidental charges if you have a metered data plan). If you have an unlimited data plan, feel free to disable the Download Over Wi-Fi only option. To do so:
    1. Open Excel (or the Office app) on your iPhone or iPad.
    2. Tap your profile photo.
    3. Tap SettingsOffline Files.
    4. Clear the Download Over Wi-Fi Only setting if you would like to allow downloads using your mobile data plan.

      Excel Download Over Wi-Fi Only option selector
  • If you make edits offline, they will sync to the cloud the next time you open the app and have internet access.
  • You need internet access the very first time you’re marking a file to be available offline. Once you see the word “Downloaded” next to the file name, you’re good to go! 

Availability

This feature is available to Insiders running Version 2.60 (Build 22040400) or later.

Don’t have it yet? It’s probably us, not you.

Features are released over some time to ensure things are working smoothly. We highlight features that you may not have because they’re slowly releasing to larger numbers of Insiders. Sometimes we remove elements to further improve them based on your feedback. Though this is rare, we also reserve the option to pull a feature entirely out of the product, even if you, as an Insider, have had the opportunity to try it.

Feedback 

If you have any feedback or suggestions, tap your profile photo, then tap Help  & Feedback, and then tap Tell Us What You Like, or Tell Us What Can Be Better

Learn what other information you should include in your feedback to ensure it’s actionable and reaches the right people. We’re excited to hear from you!

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