Excel files with formulas can be vulnerable. When text is entered into a cell with a formula, the formula can be overwritten and lost forever. Moreover, many Excel files shouldn’t be easily taken over by competitors. The ‘Excel lock cells’ function, also known as cell protection, allows you to make cells both unmodifiable and invisible. You can prevent certain cells from being changed or specific underlying formulas from being viewed. This helps ensure that competitors or users can’t easily duplicate your work. Additionally, it can significantly reduce error-proneness by allowing users to only modify specific cells. In summary, the ‘Excel lock cells’ function is an incredibly useful addition to your spreadsheets. Interested in learning how to use the ‘Excel lock cells’ function? Feel free to keep reading.
How to Implement Excel Lock Cells?
Using the ‘Excel lock cells’ function is not complicated at all. In this paragraph, we’ll explain how to make this function work in your favor.
A sheet can be protected by right-clicking on the sheet and choosing “Protect Sheet.” Then, the sheet can be protected with or without a password. Using a password is always recommended. Passwords for cell protection are case-sensitive. If you forget a password, it can become a major problem since protected cells can’t be used anymore. Before you protect a sheet, you need to indicate for each cell whether you want to protect it or not. By default, all cells are protected.
If you select any cell and go to cell properties, then protection, there are two options to choose from: Locked & Hidden.
Locked cells cannot be modified when a sheet is protected. In hidden cells, formulas are no longer visible when a sheet is protected. All cells that need to remain available for modifications should be selected in this way. Of course, you can select multiple cells and remove the blocking once. For hidden cells, this option is turned off by default, so you need to activate this function for all cells you want to hide.
While protecting a sheet, you can choose between specific options. This allows you to make the freedom for a user of a protected worksheet stricter or less strict. There are different options to choose from, so you should consider what’s useful for each worksheet.
Need help with Excel?
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Curious about what else Excel has to offer? Read about histograms in Excel, Excel time tracking, and conditional formatting in Excel.