It is commonplace nowadays for any business to use Excel as their preferred tool to input, manage, and share work. While some users continue to share files as email attachments, this can quickly result in too many downloaded versions of the same file. Not only can this be confusing to know which download is the most up-to-date version, but it can also cause issues with collaboration and productivity.
Luckily, Excel for Microsoft 365 and Excel for the web let you collaborate with others on a single version of your spreadsheet, as long as the file is saved to OneDrive or SharePoint. The screenshots below come from an older version of Excel for Mac, so some buttons may look slightly different in yours. This article will explain how to share an Excel file on Mac for multiple users, how to protect a shared Excel workbook, and how to make the Excel file editable for multiple users.
If you want to be able to share only parts of your files, you should consider Sheetgo, an AI-powered data automation platform. In addition to sharing whole files, you can share parts of your files and manipulate the data by filtering, merging, or splitting it. This allows you and your team to work collaboratively without sacrificing privacy. To learn more about this, check out this post on how to transfer filtered Excel data between workbooks using Sheetgo.
2. As instructed in the pop-up window, you can either “Move” or “Copy” the file. Unless you wish to maintain a local copy, then select “Move” as shown below.
3. Once you select your preferred option, you can change the name or not. Since we chose “Move”, we have kept the original file name.
4. Below the “Name” field, you have the “Place” drop-down menu. This will allow you to choose between OneDrive or any other previously created local or shared folder.
5. To explore more places to share the file, click on “Other”.
6. In the new window, you can also choose to “+Add a Place” in case you would like to share your file to more than one OneDrive folder or shared local folder.
7. At this point, you can also choose to connect OneDrive for Business or SharePoint.
NOTE: OneDrive provides a files experience on all devices via web, mobile, and the desktop (Windows PC or Mac OS). OneDrive for Business is part of Microsoft 365 (including the SharePoint server) and grants company employees with personal storage managed from a central location. SharePoint can act as a platform for portals, news, business apps, etc. For more information on the advantages of each, read this Microsoft Support entry.
8. Let’s use the standard OneDrive and click on “Choose Location”.
9. Complete the sharing process by selecting “Upload”, next to “Move” option.
10. Just to be sure, check that the “AutoSave” is “ON” in the top-left corner of your Excel file.
11. You can also “Send a Copy” as an email attachment, at the very bottom of the pop-up window.
12. Select the file format you would like to attach.
13. Click on “Email as Attachment”.
14. Alternatively, select the upload icon next to “Email as Attachment” to upload to one of the options shown below.
2. You will be prompted to enter a password.
IMPORTANT: Note that this feature protects your workbook from being moved, deleted, hidden, renamed, etc., and the steps followed are similar to what is explained in how to password-protect an Excel file. However, changes can be made to individual sheets. In order to protect specific data, you need to go to Review > Protect Sheet. For a full step-by-step illustration of different methods and levels of protection, read our article on how to lock cells in Excel.
Now you know how to protect your Excel from removing track changes or changing history features. This is a good way to keep track of any modifications in case you want to revert or undo any editing made to the shared Excel workbook. Moreover, it’s the only way to resolve any conflicting changes in a shared Excel file.
How to make an Excel file editable by multiple users?
You can either specify the users that can edit or simply make the whole Excel shared workbook editable by not following the “Protect Sheet” process. This way, anyone with access to the shared workbook (on OneDrive, OneDrive for Business, or SharePoint) will be able to make changes to the file without the owner having to accept or reject their changes.
To allow specific users to edit:
1. Go to the “File” tab and select “Share”.
2. Or click on the “Share” button to the far right of the Excel window and select “Invite People”.
3. Then, simply type in the email address of users you want to allow to edit and make sure you leave the “Can Edit” box ticked. When you are done, click on the “Share” button.
So far, we have shown how you can manage to edit and share options locally. Although this would also require that you are online, you can make these changes directly via OneDrive.
As you can see below, it allows users to “Open” the spreadsheet in the browser or desktop.
This is a great built-in feature since users might work on different Excel versions. In some cases, it may be more advisable for everyone to edit the shared file in the browser.
Once a project or task is finished, you might want to unshare the Excel file to safeguard the work that has been done so far. In Microsoft 365, click “Share”, open “Manage access”, and remove the people or links you no longer need. Older versions that still use the legacy shared workbook feature have an “Unshare Workbook” button in the “Review” tab instead. If you cannot find either option, you can move the shared file to a local folder.
When you want the file back to yourself, here’s how to unshare an Excel file.
2. Choose the destination file or let Sheetgo create a new one. Below, I have selected a workbook that the user has access to, but you can easily create and share a new workbook.
3. Automate your connection so that the other users have up-to-date data to work with.
Conclusion
Now you know how to share an Excel file or workbook and how to make it editable by multiple users. Whether you are working on Windows or Mac OS, you need to make sure that you apply the editing features before sharing the Excel file, since shared workbooks do not have all the features that Excel desktop has. Please remember that as you are sharing your Excel workbooks online, you must have an internet connection at all times – if not, you may risk losing important edits and changes to your Excel files.
Alternatively, you can try Sheetgo for free to automate data transfers and access more advanced features, like sharing only parts of your files, including Excel, Google Sheets, and CSV/TSV files. Sheetgo’s AI Processor can also clean up or summarize the data before your team sees it.
Prefer to collaborate on Google Sheets? Take a look at our article on how to password-protect a Google Sheet to control the changes made to your spreadsheets by other users.
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