Compare versions of an Excel workbook
If others may modify your worksheet, you may open it and wonder who on earth has changed this the Excel workbook and what did they change exactly. Microsoft Spreadsheet Compare can help you answer these questions by emphasising the changes that have occurred. Assume your organisation is scheduled to be audited. You need a trail for your essential workbooks that demonstrates the changes from month to month or year to year. This trail can help you identify and repair errors before the auditors do.
Spreadsheet Compare can be used to check for changes in Visual Basic for Applications code as well as to compare worksheet contents. The findings are given in a window that allows you to compare the differences side by side.
- Launch Spreadsheet Compare:
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\root\Client\AppVLP.exe" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office16\DCF\SPREADSHEETCOMPARE.EXE" - In the lower-left pane, select the choices to include in the workbook comparison, such as formulae, cell formatting, or macros. Alternatively, just select all.
- Under the Home menu, select Compare Files.
- Browse the Compare row in the Compare Files dialogue box.
- Navigate to the previous version of your workbook. In addition to files saved on your computer or network, you can specify a web link to a location where your workbooks are saved.
Compare Files command
- Under the Compare Files dialogue box, under the to row, select the version you wish to compare the older version to.
- You can compare two files with the same name that are saved in different folders.
- To run the comparison, select OK.
- If you see an "Unable to open workbook" warning, this may indicate that the workbook is password locked. Click OK, then input the password. The comparison results appear in a two-pane grid. The workbook on the left relates to the "Compare" file you selected, while the workbook on the right corresponds to the "To" file. Details show in a pane beneath the two grids. Changes are marked in distinct colours based on the type of change.
Comparison results
In the side-by-side grid, a worksheet from each file is compared to the worksheet from the other file, starting with the leftmost worksheet in each. Spreadsheet Compare may still show and compare worksheets that are hidden in a workbook.
If the cells are too narrow to display their contents, select Resize Cells to Fit.
Depending on the sort of difference, cell fill, or text font colour is used to highlight it. Cells with "entered values" (non-formula cells) are presented with a green fill colour in the side-by-side grid, as well as a green font in the pane results list. The lower-left pane contains a legend that explains what the colours imply.
You can export your results to an Excel file or copy and paste them into another software, like Microsoft Word, if you want to store them or analyse them somewhere else. Obtaining a high-fidelity view of each spreadsheet that closely resembles Excel's cell formatting is another option.
- The results can be exported to an Excel file that is simpler to understand. Go to Home > Export Results.
- To copy and paste the results to another program, select Home > Copy Results to Clipboard.
- Select Home > Show Workbook Colours to display the workbook's cell formatting.
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