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Imagine you spend hours building reports, budgets, or project trackers, and Excel refuses to open the file, displays messages like “Excel found unreadable content,” “The file is corrupt and cannot be opened,” or simply crashes. Sounds scary!! Not only that, but you may also get:
- “Excel found unreadable content” while opening the workbook.
- The workbook opens but shows blank worksheets.
- “Excel found unreadable content” error
- Charts, formulas, or PivotTables vanish unexpectedly.
- Excel freezes, crashes or the workbook opens with formatting errors.
- Excel automatically closes after selecting the workbook.
- File size changes unexpectedly without explanation.
- Error messages appear while saving the workbook.
These symptoms are a sign of Excel file corruption means damage in file structure.
If you’re experiencing one or more of these issues, your workbook has been corrupted. Still, you can recover it because your data has not been lost permanently. This guide tells you how to recover corrupted Excel file 2016 using practical and step-by-step methods. Here we go!
Why Do Excel 2016 Files Become Corrupted? Know Real Culprits
Every problem has a cause. Here are the common reasons why Excel 2016 files get corrupted. Understand them first:
- A sudden shutdown when working on Excel
- Windows crashes or forced restarts
- Bad sectors on hard drives, SSD failures, or corrupted USB drives.
- Certain malware modifies Office documents
- Poorly developed Excel add-ins may sometimes interfere
- Saving files directly to a shared network location or NAS under a spotty connection.
- Excel file overloaded with thousands of formulas, PivotTables, macros, Power Query connections, or embedded objects
Prerequisites to Consider Before You Recover Corrupted Excel File
Follow these before you start to recover corrupted Excel file 2016:
- Create a copy of the original Excel file.
- Close other Office applications to free up the system from hindrances.
- Make sure that the Excel file extension (.xlsx, .xls, or .xlsm) hasn’t been changed.
- Check for previous versions of the file if they are stored in OneDrive or SharePoint.
- Don’t open Excel files from a USB device or network share. Move the file to a local drive first.
- Try to open the Excel file in different applications such as LibreOffice Calc, Google Sheets, etc.
- Open Excel 2016 in Safe Mode. Press Windows + R, then type excel /safe and press Enter. Now open your Excel file.
- Uncheck suspicious or recently installed add-ins. Click File > Options > Add-ins. Select COM Add-ins and click Go. Uncheck, then restart.
Methods to Recover Corrupted Excel File 2016
You can opt for any methods from native to professional to recover a corrupted Excel 2016 file. Here are the steps explained:
Method 1: Use Excel’s Open and Repair Feature
With the built-in repair option, Excel 2016 can also fix minor workbook corruption, damaged headers, as well as structure issues. Follow these steps to recover corrupted Excel file 2016:
- Open Microsoft Excel 2016 and go to File > Open.
- Tap on Browse and select the damaged workbook.
- From the Open dropdown, choose Open and Repair.
- Click Repair. The repair process will start. The Excel file will open after a while.
Still, if Excel fails to repair the workbook, select Extract Data to recover formulas and cell values.
Method 2: Restore an AutoRecover Version
If Excel crashed or power was lost unexpectedly while working, you can recover Excel using an AutoRecover feature. It doesn’t repair corruption directly, but it can help recover a recent working version. Here is how you can use AutoRecover:
- Open your Excel, then go to File > Open.
- Select Recent and tap on Recover Unsaved Workbooks available at the bottom.
- Browse the available recovery files and open the latest version.
- You can also save them with a new filename and access them anytime.
Method 3: Recover Previous Version of Excel File
Windows with File History enabled allows you to restore earlier versions of the file. You can restore the previous version instead of the current damaged version. Follow these steps to recover an Excel file 2016 or previous version:
- In File Explorer, locate and right-click on your Excel file. After that, choose Properties.
- Go to the Previous Versions tab and look for an earlier version. If found, select that and tap on Restore.
After you successfully restore the previous version of your Excel file, open it and check the file contents (rows and columns, formulas, index, etc.) for integrity.
Method 4: Recover Excel from OneDrive Version History
You don’t need to worry when your Excel workbook is stored in OneDrive or SharePoint. Microsoft automatically keeps earlier versions of the file. Restoring one of these versions is often faster than repairing a severely damaged workbook.
- Sign in to OneDrive account, locate your Excel file, right-click on it, and select Version History.
- Review the available versions and open a version that you think is healthy.
- Restore or download the required version and use it as you want.
- Excel closes immediately after opening the file.
- Missing worksheets in Excel file.
- Formula results are replaced with errors.
- Excel repeatedly reports unreadable content.
- The workbook opens as a blank file.
- Sudden change in the workbook size from 0 KB to another size.
At this time, follow a dedicated repair method instead of a repeated manual recovery process.
A Simpler and Direct Way to Fix Corrupted Excel 2016 Files
If none of the built-in recovery methods work, the workbook may have extensive structural damage that Excel cannot repair. With multiple worksheets, embedded charts, formulas, PivotTables, macros, or other complex elements, the issue with Excel (.xls or .xlsx) is common.
In such cases, you can take the help of Kernel Excel Repair to recover data with no modification to the original workbook. In fact, it repairs severely corrupted XLS and XLSX (Excel 2010, 2016, or other) files with preserved:
- Multiple worksheets
- Cell formatting
- Charts and graphs
- Formulas and functions
- Images and objects
- Comments and hyperlinks
- PivotTables
- Cell styles, etc.
Conclusion
All in all, your corrupted Excel workbook still has data you can recover with the right approach. Microsoft Excel 2016 provides several recovery options, and you now know them along with their stepwise process. So, recover corrupted Excel File 2016 with the right recovery approach based on your situation.
However, Excel file corruption is a serious situation. It affects the internal structure of Excel workbooks, and many times manual methods may not be enough. In such situations, opt for the Excel repair solution and restore your important as well as entire Excel file components altogether.
Frequently Asked Questions
A: Yes, data recovery is often possible depending on the level of corruption. Excel’s repair options may work for minor damaged files. For severely corrupted workbooks, specialized Excel repair software can help.
A: Excel’s Open and Repair feature mostly protects existing data, but with high corruption levels, some data may not be recovered completely.
A: In many cases, yes. Excel’s built-in repair option preserves workbook formatting, formulas, charts, and worksheet structures if the issue is minor. However, severely damaged files may experience some data loss during recovery.
