How to reopen an unsaved excel file

Have you ever lost an Excel file because you accidentally closed it without saving it? Or because your computer crashed? It's really frustrating, but you don't have to start over.

There are a few ways you can recover unsaved Excel files. You might not get the latest version with all of your most recent changes, but it's a lot better than starting from scratch.

Let's take a look at those recovery methods to see how they're done.

Recovering Excel Files in Windows

There are three main methods of recovering unsaved and overwritten files from Excel. If you close an unsaved workbook, you might be able to get it back using Excel's Recover Unsaved Workbooks function.

Recovering Unsaved Excel Workbooks

If you've somehow lost access to your unsaved Excel workbook, don't worry—we've got your back. Follow the below-given steps to recover any Excel file that hasn't been saved yet.

1. Open any Excel workbook.
2. Go to File > Open and click the Recent option to see all the Excel files that you've previously opened on your desktop or laptop.

3. At the bottom of the screen, you'll see the Recover Unsaved Workbooks button.

4. Click that button, and you'll see a list of unsaved files.

5. Now, just double-click any file from the explorer to open it.

If you're lucky, your file will be there, and you can just load it to backup again. Make sure to save it right away.

Recovering Overwritten Excel Files From OneDrive

If you don't currently save your Excel files to OneDrive, this might convince you to start. OneDrive keeps a version history that you can browse and restore from whenever you'd like. You can save them wherever you want, but the Documents folder seems like a logical place.

It's easiest to complete this process through the OneDrive browser interface. To recover your unsaved Excel file from OneDrive, follow these steps:

1. First, head to onedrive.live.com.

2. Click on the folder you saved your file in (in our case, that's Documents).

3. Now, find the document you're looking for, and right-click it.

4. Select Version history. You'll now see a list of versions that OneDrive has stored. Thankfully, you'll even be able to preview each version.

5. Find the one you're looking for, and select Restore to overwrite the current version of the document or Download to download a copy of that version.

No doubt, Microsoft OneDrive is a great tool for storing and sharing files. Nothing to worry about if you regularly backup your office files to this powerful cloud service.

If you're a beginner yet and want to get started, we recommend checking out our guide on some amazing tips for OneDrive users.

Restore Previous Versions From File History

If you don't use OneDrive, there's still a chance that you'll be able to recover your overwritten Excel documents. If you've enabled File History in Windows, you can use that to find old versions.

Don't know about File History? Check out our guide to recovering lost files on Windows and enable it today. You'll be glad you did.

If you've enabled File History, just navigate to your file in Windows Explorer. Right-click the file and select Restore previous versions:

A new window will appear, and you'll see any previous versions that you can restore.

Note: If you haven't turned on File History and haven't created a restore point, you won't have any options.

If you've been backing up your data, though, you might be able to get your Excel document back.

Recovering Excel Files in macOS

Recovering your unsaved or overwritten Excel files is a bit different on a Mac. You can use the same process to restore previous versions from OneDrive if you've been saving them there. That's the easiest way to go.

If you aren't using OneDrive—and you don't have backed-up versions of your documents—you have one main option.

1. To start, open Finder and go to Macintosh HD.

2. If you don't see Macintosh HD (or another name for your hard drive), go to Finder > Preferences and select Hard disks under Show these items in the sidebar.

3. Now, you've to go to Users > [your username] > Library > Application Support > Microsoft > Office > Office 2011 AutoRecovery.

4. If you can't see the Library folder in your user folder, you'll need to show hidden files. First, enter the following command into the terminal:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles YES

Then, Option + Right-click the Finder icon and select Relaunch.

Tip: You can use the terminal to make this process easier by typing the following command to open the proper folder:

open /Users/[your username]/Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/Office/Office\ 2011\ AutoRecovery

Depending on your version of Office, you may need to go to a different folder. Excel 2016, for example, saves files in ~/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Excel/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery/. If you're having trouble finding your AutoRecovery files, run a search for your version of Office to see where others have found theirs.

5. Once you find your files, just double-click to open them and make sure to save them immediately.

Related: Mac Time Machine Alternatives for Backing Up Your Data

Kindly note that Excel only keeps these AutoRecovered documents for a limited time, so it's best to regularly backup your system and files.

The Lesson: Save Often and Back Everything Up

While these methods for recovering deleted and overwritten Excel files will work, they're not the best. They can be quite involved, and they won't necessarily get you the version of the spreadsheet you were hoping for.

The best thing you can do is to often save (autosaving will help) and use a backup solution that supports file versioning. That being said, these methods will surely help when you don't have any other options.