Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Microsoft 365. If you are using an earlier version (Excel 2003 or earlier), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for earlier versions of Excel, click here: Hyperlinks in Shared Workbooks.
Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated November 29, 2023)
This tip applies to Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Microsoft 365
Dan has a shared workbook into which he needs to insert a hyperlink. However, as long as the workbook is shared, the hyperlink features in Excel are not available. Dan wonders if there is a way to insert hyperlinks into shared workbooks.
The short answer is no, there is not. When you choose to share a workbook, some options in Excel are simply not available anymore; inserting hyperlinks is one of those options that is removed once the workbook is shared.
If you absolutely must add the hyperlink to the workbook, the only option is to un-share the workbook, add the hyperlink, and then again share the workbook. You'll no longer be able to add any more hyperlinks, but the one you added while the workbook was unshared will work just fine.
There is one caveat in taking this approach to adding the hyperlink—you need to be careful that you don't un-share the workbook if you have the Track Changes feature of Excel turned on. In the process of un-sharing the workbook, Excel will turn off the tracking and discard the change history. If this is important to you, the only option is to make sure that you add the hyperlinks before sharing the workbook and first turning on Track Changes.
ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (11058) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Microsoft 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Hyperlinks in Shared Workbooks.
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2019-05-20 17:43:39
Dennis Costello
@Gary ... while I've never used this feature, I'll hazard a guess that there's a difference between storing a workbook in a shared location and telling Excel that it will be shared. In the first case, several team members might access the same copy of it, and as long as they're careful not to allow more than one person to make changes to it at once everything will be fine. But Excel allows a more sophisticated case, in which several people can have the workbook open at the same time, and changes that any of them make to it will be visible to the others "in real time". This note talks about the second case.
This (old) Microsoft article talks about this feature... https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/269860/how-to-use-shared-workbooks-with-different-versions-of-excel, including these steps for setting up sharing (on Excel 2007):
1. Click the Review tab.
2. Click Share Workbook in the Changes group.
3. On the Editing tab, click to select the Allow changes by more than one user at the same time. This also allows workbook merging check box, and then click OK.
4. In the Save As dialog box, save the shared workbook on a network location where other users can gain access to it.
Meanwhile, I think this qualifies as an Excel "quirk", and not a feature necessitated by how things work under the covers. Unless there's some sort of extensive validation performed on Hyperlinks when they're added to a workbook, which could not easily be done as an atomic operation and thus couldn't be done reliably in the context of a shared workbook. But that sounds unlikely. Oh well ... anything as large as Excel is bound to have its quirks, I suppose.
2019-01-17 10:51:40
Gary
I have a workbook that is saved in SharePoint, and shared with our whole team. We have no problem adding hyperlinks to it, so I'm not sure I understand what is being discussed here.
Thank you!
2019-01-16 01:46:16
Hisham Saifudeen
I store the files that need to be accessible by everyone in OneDrive and copy paste the link of that file in the shared Excel workbook.
Works fine.
2019-01-15 15:13:33
J. Woolley
@Roy: You might be interested in my SuperLink function described here:
http://dailydoseofexcel.com/archives/2018/07/02/hyperlink-formula-events/#comment-1045646
2019-01-14 20:08:33
Roy
To have hyperlinks that can change over time without unsharing:
BEFORE sharing, write a macro that will take a text writing of the desired hyperlink and act upon it as if it were an actual hyperlink. Macros added before sharing are always available to run. Since text can obviously be added any time, one can add new "hyperlinks" without a need to unshare and re-share.
Of course, to add it to an existing shared workbook, one would have to navigate the rocks and schoals described in Mr. Wyatt's answer.
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