Allow a site owner to kick a user out of a file opened in Excel Online
If you have multiple people co-authoring in Excel Online, there are times when you need to open the file in Excel - typically for advanced formatting, etc. If someone has accidentally left the file open in their browser, there is no way to force them out and keeps the file locked. Although not always intentional, it can create a major headache by not being able to simply kick/close out that particular user from editing.
Anonymous
shared this idea
Thank you for your feedback, the feature is under review, please keep voting.
Tamar {MSFT}
72 comments
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Greg Simonis
commented
@MathewKostak
Very good point Matt. I will stick to the topic at hand.Anyone found a way to UNLOCK a file that someone else has LOCKED FOR EDITING?
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Matthew Kostak
commented
Everyone on this thread - we are almost all aware of O365 capabilities in the desktop and browser. There are many reasons people can get locked out of a file. Upload Center cache corruption, "check out", someone's computer crashing during a file save. Many things can cause a user to lock a file, EVEN YOU can lock out a file unintentionally. What this post is asking is for us to be able to administratively perform a command in SharePoint/OneDrive/Teams, wherever the file is stored, and "unlock" or "kick" that person out of the file. That is the ask, not to just be able to have multiple people edit in different browsers.
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Eddie
commented
@Greg Simonis @Ryan
That's not true if you have Office 365. I used to have the same problem as you Ryan.If you have Office 365, you can edit both online and desktop app at the same time with no interference. I usually have 4-5 ppl using at the same time online and it was hard to communicate with everyone to close the file so I can edit on my desktop. On Office 365, I don't care how many people are online using the file, I can always click "Open in Desktop App" and start editing things that I can't do online. If someone is editing online during that time, I can see it on my desktop app as well. My life is so much easier now :)
I was using Office 2013 Excel before. I can't confirm for other versions but Office 365 is what you are all looking for.
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Ryan
commented
@Greg Simonis: That's useful info--thank you. Very, very difficult to communicate those caveats to users, though. If both Excel Online and regular Excel disallow a user to do something unsupported--and provide a clear error message why they cannot--that would be fine. That has not been my experience, though. I've seen where people open up the same file in regular Excel, and suddenly the Excel Online folks are left wondering why it's acting weird. No error message of any kind initially; eventually they get an error message, but it is not a helpful message at all, and certainly doesn't point to the real issue.
In addition to resolving those issues, the ability to kick someone out of a file is still necessary.
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Greg Simonis
commented
Just to be clear on this issue:
- YOU CAN edit an Excel file in either the browser or in Excel, if you are the ONLY one editing the Excel file.
- If two people want to edit the file at the same time, AND one person opens it in Excel, the 2nd person CANNOT edit the file in the browser. * The ONLY way this can be done is by both people editing the file in the browser *
- This IS NOT an issue for a Word file. Two people can edit a Word file at the same time, with one person editing it in the browser AND the other person editing it in Word. -
Eddie
commented
Good News!
You can now edit the file in Office 365 on your desktop even other people are using the file with no interruption. I'm sure many of the people here are not aware of it. I just found out recently updating to 365. Hope this help!
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Anonymous
commented
File owner should be able to boot out users that are idling in the document to make necessary changes/version uploads as needed.
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Greg Simonis
commented
New 2016 version allows you to edit in excel AND in the browser - Is this for online AND on premise? Or just on premise? We are using 365 ProPlus online version and that statement is not true for us.
That statement is true ONLY if they are editing the Excel file in the browser. As soon as a User opens it in the Excel application, that file is now locked for editing by that one User and all others get a read only version.
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Mark
commented
Excel online lacks what is business as usual in Google sheets. No good for collaboration when you can't paste in data >1000 rows or take it offline for editing when another user has accidentally left it open.
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Anonymous
commented
Still very much needed we need to check the file out to run a macro weekly so we need our worldwide users out of the document.
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nothanks
commented
Even if co-authoring has been improved basic admin tools such as the ability to kick users out of a document if you want to/need to delete it is still very much neccesary.
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Eric Diederich
commented
This is still needed if you want to delete a file.
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Jess
commented
New 2016 version allows you to edit in excel AND online at the same time so no need for this feature now. You can collaborate in real time online and via the application.
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Fakhrulhilal Maktum
commented
3 years and it's still UNDER REVIEW? Office 365 is poor for collaboration, compared to google docs. Now I see why it's not getting better. A crucial feature for collaboration and nothing change for 3 years.
I've office 365 Pro Plus. I can't edit through excel app if anyone is still editing through excel web. -
Anonymous
commented
FYI.
After we upgraded to Office 365 Pro Plus, instead of Office 2016 version, we can now allow the multiple users to edit the same excel file in either the web browser or Excel Desktop version at the same time.Co-authoring is working properly, unnecessary to kick out the user as my understanding.
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Taylor Meadows
commented
Same problem. Would be great if we can receive a response from Microsoft. Google docs already has this feature.
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hendrikkus
commented
I have a same problem, other user left the excel online browser opened for many hours. I need the feature in excel online to kick out the user.
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Anonymous
commented
Votes do not matter. This is just an outlet for user's to express what they want. A Microsoft representative checks in and updates once every couple of years to maintain the appearance that they are active.
They develop what they want, when they want, regardless of user input (thats why they are constantly developing new and useless features) -
Anonymous
commented
How many votes are needed before the issue is considered for resolution?
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Anonymous
commented
Oh sorry..I missed that 2016 reply. Anything since then???
