People safeguard sensitive data on excel sheets by password protecting them. Password protection is a good option for people who do not want to share their critical data with others. But sometimes, when you are working with a team, you need to share the data. And if you are working on a password-protected excel file, then you can’t just send that file over to your teammate or friend. First, you need to unprotect the excel file or sheet and then send it over to someone else.
There are several ways to remove the password from protected Excel sheets, and here in this article, we will see how you can do it using Microsoft Excel. We will also take a look at few other ways to remove passwords from password-protected excel files. So without any further ado, let’s get into it.
Also Read
How to Remove Password From Excel Protected Sheets?
Before getting into the entire process of removing the password, you need to determine whether the entire excel file is encrypted or if it’s only a sheet within the workbook that’s protected. To determine that, you need to open the excel file. If you can open it up and view the data in it, but you can’t edit the data in it, then you can be sure that only one worksheet in the Excel workbook is password-protected. But if you see a pop-up that asks for a password and says that the file is protected, you can be sure that the entire file is encrypted.
How to Unprotect an Excel Sheet if You Know the Password?
To remove the password from a protected Excel sheet, the process is simple if you remember the actual password. You need to get into the Settings and disable the password protection feature.
- Open up the password-protected Excel file. If the file is not encrypted, it will open up and show all the data without you needing to enter the password for it. But you won’t be able to edit any part of this data. To edit, you need to unprotect it. And to unprotect it, find the protected sheet in the workbook. It will be the sheet with a small padlock next to its name. The name of the sheets can be found at the bottom of the workbook.
- Once you spot the protected sheet with the padlock next to it, right-click on it and choose Unprotect Sheet.
- Microsoft Excel will ask for the password for this protected excel sheet. Enter the password correctly and click on Ok.
- You will notice that the padlock that was there next to the sheet name is no longer there. This means that your previously protected sheet is now unprotected. You can send this excel file over to your friends now and enable them to edit the details in it too.