How to Unlock Excel Workbook Without Password?
Excel provides a simple method for locking and protecting your workbooks and worksheets with a password. But what happens if you lose these passwords or forget them first? If this unfortunate event has befallen you, the good news is that Excel provides many paid and unpaid options for re-protecting and unprotecting excel workbooks. This information is relevant for Excel workbooks created in Microsoft Excel 365, Microsoft Excel 2019, Microsoft Excel 2016, and Microsoft Excel 2013.
There are a Few Reasons Why the File is Locked
- The file is being edited concurrently by two different users because it is shared.
- Currently, a separate instance of the Office programme is operating in the background, and it already has the file opened.
- The file has been flagged as Final, meaning it can no longer have any changes made to it.
People face many problems if they cannot unlock the Excel sheets. They cannot edit or make any changes to the excel file. As a result of the locked workbook, they became frustrated, and now they need to redo it again. They are required to pay for services to decrypt the workbook, but it is unknown whether or not the password can be retrieved. Furthermore, if they use any service, there is a possibility that they will lose the data or anything else that is present in the file.
How to Protect Excel Sheets?
Follow These Steps to Protect a Sheet in Excel 2016, 2013, or 2010.
Step 1: At the bottom of your screen, you will see a tab for a worksheet. Click the tab with your right mouse button, and then pick Protect Sheet from the context menu.
Step 2: Perform the following actions within the Protect Sheet dialogue window
1. Enter your password into the appropriate section to safeguard your Excel sheet with a password. You will need the password in the future to unprotect the sheet, so either make sure you can recall it easily or put it away somewhere secure.
2. Let’s say that protecting the worksheet is just a way to make sure that you or other people on your local team don’t change the contents of the sheet by accident. In that case, you may not want to try memorising the password and instead leave the password field empty. It is especially true if the only reason for the protection is to prevent accidental modification of the sheet contents by yourself. Single click the Unprotect Sheet button on the ribbon to unprotect the sheet.
3. Choose the activities that the users will be able to participate in.
4. The following two options, select locked cells and select unlocked cells, are selected by default. If you choose only these two options, users of your sheet, including yourself, will only be able to select cells if you do not deselect any other options (both locked and unlocked).
5. If you want to perform further actions like sorting, filtering, formatting cells, deleting, or inserting rows and columns, you need to check the boxes that relate to those activities.
6. Users will only be allowed to view the contents of your Excel sheet if they do not check any actions in the box provided for that purpose.
7. To continue, select the OK button.
Step 3: A dialogue box titled “Confirm Password” will appear, urging you to retype the password. It ensures that an error in typing the password will not permanently lock your Excel sheet. Please retype the password, then press the OK button.
How to Unprotect Excel Sheets?
The Protected Sheet can be Unlocked in a Flash if you know the Password. Choose one of the Following Options
Step 1: Click the Unprotect Sheet button in the Review tab’s Changes group.
Step 2: On the Review tab, in the Changes group, click Unprotect Sheet.
Step 3: Click the Format button within the Cells group on the Home tab. Then, from the drop-down menu, select Unprotect Sheet.
Step 4: Excel will prompt you to enter the password if a password protects the worksheet you are working with. Enter the password, and then click the OK button. If the worksheet was not password protected, all that is required to unlock the sheet is to click the Unprotect Sheet button on the toolbar.
[5] Password Remover Paid and Free Online Tools
Password-protected Excel files can be opened and accessed in a flash using a user-friendly online Excel password recovery tool. But while addressing the problem, data security cannot be ignored. Data loss and theft are problems that can arise if you are not careful. Therefore, be very careful when selecting an online excel password remover tool. Below are the top five online free Excel password removers to unlock and restore your password-protected Excel files quickly.
One of the best online programs you can use for MS Excel password recovery is LostMyPass MS Excel Password Recovery. It is because it is an Excel password remover. It allows you to recover your lost MS Excel password for a free trial and pay both by searching a database containing three million instances of the most common passwords.
Recovering a weak password does not cost anything and can be completed in minutes.
The strong password recovery service will cost you extra money. And it’s not exactly affordable. In addition, the maximum file size should be 100 megabytes.
Password-online is yet another online tool that may delete Excel passwords. It has its exclusive technology for recovering passwords for Microsoft Office Excel 97, 2000, or 2003 using 40-bit keys, which enables you to recover the encrypted file in a matter of seconds.
It is possible to rapidly open password-protected Excel documents, regardless of the length or difficulty of the password. Absolutely nothing to lose.
It is only compatible with Excel 97, 2000, and 2003; it is not compatible with Excel 2010/2013/2016/2019.
The service to unprotect Excel sheets online is made available by Password-Find.com. Nevertheless, it has excellent capabilities for removing passwords from Microsoft Word documents, Microsoft PowerPoint presentations, and Visual Basic for Applications projects. It can delete the password in a pretty short amount of time, which will not require much of your time on your part.
The initial trial is completely free. It can ultimately unlock all protected Microsoft Office 97-2003 documents and around 80% of protected Microsoft Office 2007-2019 documents.
You must pay $39.95 to find the password for just one document. It’sIt’s a bit out of my price range.
Straxx Excel Password Removal is a powerful and free Excel password remover application that not only enables you to edit password-protected workbooks but also can unlock excel files that have been encrypted with a password. It will eliminate passwords of any length, even passwords with special characters. If you want to erase passwords from Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, or 2016, try utilising this rather than the high-risk Excel password breaker.
It provides a free version that is useful for non-commercial purposes exclusively. The integrity of the data in its original form will be preserved throughout the process.
You will need to pay a fee if you want to remove the password from Excel 2013/2016/2019 for Windows or 2016/2019 for Mac.
Groupdocs Password Online Recovery Tool, is another fantastic online application that may assist you in removing the password from an Excel document. You may decrypt the Excel file by uploading it to an online server and then allowing the tool to start working on it. It will enable you to unlock the file.
It decrypts DOCX, PPTX, XLSX, PPT, ZIP, ODP, XLS, DOC, and various other file and document types. Upload and unlock your Excel, Word, PowerPoint, and PDF documents in your browser. It can unlock files from any location and is compatible with all platforms, including Windows, macOS, Android, and iOS. There is no file size limit, and new features are added monthly.
- Free trials are available. If the file cannot encrypt, no charge will incur.
- Easily convert, view or merge unlimited files on your own Windows PC.
- Process Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF and more than 100 file formats.
- No limit on file size.
- Batch conversion of multiple files.
- N/A
How to Protect and Unprotect Cells in Excel Using VBA
The fact that sheet protection has to be applied one sheet at a time is one of the most aggravating aspects of the process. If only one document has to be protected, then everything will be alright. However, if we have more than five sheets, it is going to be a time-consuming process. For this reason, a very significant number of people look to a VBA solution.
VBA Code to Protect a Sheet
Including a password in VBA to provide additional security is a simple process. The password is hardcoded into the macro in these examples; however, this may not be the most secure method for your particular circumstance. It is possible that applying with the help of a string variable or capturing user passwords with an input box is the best option.
| Sub ProtectSheet()
Sheets(“SheetName”).Protect Password:= ” “Password” End Sub |
VBA to Unprotect Sheet
| Sub UnprotectSheet()
Sheets(“SheetName”).Unprotect Password:= ” “Password” End Sub |
How to Unprotect an Excel Workbook Without the Password
You may have safeguarded your Excel workbook or spreadsheet and haven’t needed to make any changes to it in quite some time—possibly even years. You once protected this spreadsheet with a password, but now that you need to make modifications, you can’t seem to recall. Thankfully, if you follow these procedures, you can deprotect your workbook by utilising a Virtual Basic script as a macro to determine the password.
Step 1- Open the locked spreadsheet.
Step 2- You may enter the code editor for Visual Basic by pressing ALT+F11 or by selecting Developer > View Code from the menu bar.
Step 3- Enter the following code into the space provided for it in the protected sheet’s Code window
| Sub PasswordBreaker()
Dim i As Integer, j As Integer, k As Integer Dim l As Integer, m As Integer, n As Integer Dim i1 As Integer, i2 As Integer, i3 As Integer Dim i4 As Integer, i5 As Integer, i6 As Integer On Error Resume Next For i = 65 To 66: For j = 65 To 66: For k = 65 To 66 For l = 65 To 66: For m = 65 To 66: For i1 = 65 To 66 For i2 = 65 To 66: For i3 = 65 To 66: For i4 = 65 To 66 For i5 = 65 To 66: For i6 = 65 To 66: For n = 32 To 126 ActiveSheet.Unprotect Chr(i) & Chr(j) & Chr(k) & _ Chr(l) & Chr(m) & Chr(i1) & Chr(i2) & Chr(i3) & _ Chr(i4) & Chr(i5) & Chr(i6) & Chr(n) If ActiveSheet.ProtectContents = False Then MsgBox “One usable password is ” & Chr(i) & Chr(j) & _ Chr(k) & Chr(l) & Chr(m) & Chr(i1) & Chr(i2) & _ Chr(i3) & Chr(i4) & Chr(i5) & Chr(i6) & Chr(n) Exit Sub End If Next: Next: Next: Next: Next: Next Next: Next: Next: Next: Next: Next End Sub |
Step 4- Select Run from the menu or press the F5 key to run the code.
Step 5- The code’s execution will take a few minutes. When you are completed, a pop-up window containing a password will appear. Select OK to remove the protection on your spreadsheet will be removed.
How to Unprotect the Workbook Using Software
You can Also Unprotect the Workbook Password Using the Technique Below
You will require a hex editor for this.
Step 1- Find the “DPB” string in the file and replace it with “DPx” using a hex editor.
Step 2- If you are attempting to unlock a file with the extension.xls or .xla, you must first open the file in your hex editor and search for the text string “DPB”
Step 3- All you need to do is change the “B” in DPB with an “x” by clicking on it.
Step 4- Save before exiting your hex editor.
If not done yet
When you open the sheet in Excel, you could get a few error notices; in this case, you should click through them.
Open the Visual Basic window and the VBAProject properties. Change the password to something less complicated and easier to keep in your head, navigate to the Protection page and click its associated button.
After saving the worksheet, close it and then open it again.
Launch Visual Basic once more, and this time, type in the password you just entered when prompted. You will need to repeat the step before, but you can delete the password this time.
You can now safely save the worksheet because the password doesn’t exist.
How to Unprotect the Workbook Using Excel Add-in
In addition, an add-in can remove protection from a workbook or worksheet even if the password is forgotten.
After opening your working file, which is protected by a password, open the add-in file and click on “worksheet password delete”.
Clicking the button labelled “delete workbook password” is what you have to do to get rid of the password for the workbook.
You can contact me if you are curious about purchasing this tool.
Conclusion
I hope you know how to protect and unprotect excel sheets/workbooks in different methods. You can also use many paid or free services to unlock the excel sheet. But remember to know the consequences before choosing any tool/trying out methods.
