7/18/2019 Unprotect an Excel spreadsheet if you have lost your password

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This entry was posted in How To Practical Advice Trick by Brian Krisanski

How to Unprotect an Excel Spreadsheet if you have lost your password.

I recently had the circumstance where a client sent me a copy of a spreadsheet that was password protected, however the client no longer had the
password to unlock the content. They were wondering if there was anything we could do…

So how do you unprotect an Excel spreadsheet when you don’t have the password? Unfortunately, there is no quick and simple way for your to
view or recover a lost password.

Microsoft’s o cial stand on this matter is:

[URL] – Microsoft

Recover a password to open a workbook or worksheet

Excel lets you password protect your workbooks, and your worksheets. But, it’s easy to forget or misplace your passwords.
Unfortunately, if that’s happened to you, we don’t have a way to help you recover a lost password.

Excel doesn’t store passwords where you or Microsoft can look them up. That’s also true for the other O ce programs that let
you protect les. That’s why it’s always a good idea to store your passwords someplace safe.

Some third-party companies o er programs for unlocking les. For legal reasons, we can’t recommend those programs. You can
try them, but at your own risk.

So what do you do if you have lost the password to unprotect an excel workbook or worksheet?

The following method MAY, we re-iterate MAY, work for you, but then again it may not as well.  We have had a good amount of success using this
method but it has not worked 100% of the time. Having said that, the method does not harm your spreadsheet nor data, so you have nothing to
lose from trying it.

How to unprotect a password protected worksheet.

 

So what do you do…

In the case of a password protected worksheet where you are unable to Edit the data you can try the following steps to unprotect your worksheet.

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7/18/2019 Unprotect an Excel spreadsheet if you have lost your password

 
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Step 1 Press ALT +  F11 or click View Code on the Developers Tab

Step 2 Double click on the worksheet that is password protected.

Step 3 Copy and paste the code below into the (Code) window. Do not change any of the code, just copy and paste it.

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7/18/2019 Unprotect an Excel spreadsheet if you have lost your password

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)
6
Social If ActiveSheet.ProtectContents = False Then
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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 Click on the Run Button or press F5.

And there you have it.

If this method worked and was able to unprotect your worksheet you’ll a small pop-up window saying “One usable password is XXXYYYZZZXXXY”.

UPDATE – Another method you can try…

If the above method did not work for you then you can try our updated method for removing passwords from an Excel spreadsheet – Click
this link to read an alternate method to removing passwords from Excel worksheets.

Having Trouble and Need some help?

Have you followed the steps outlined above, but are still having trouble restoring full access to your worksheet?
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7/18/2019 Unprotect an Excel spreadsheet if you have lost your password
We can help you!

Since writing this article we have received many, many requests for help from people needing to remove the passwords from their
spreadsheets.

To request our help, please click the following link:

Click here to request help from ExcelSuperSite

Continue the Discussion

Have you had to unprotect a password protected spreadsheet? If so, how do you do it? Did you use a similar format to above or another 
method? Continue the discussion and add your thoughts in the comments section at the bottom of this article.

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