
Sheets doesn’t have certain functions that a company needs.Policy requires sending documents as attachments rather than links.Users may not want to be tied to the Google ecosystem.A key person may not want to use Google Sheets.There are a variety of reasons an organization may decide to switch from Google Sheets to Excel for its spreadsheet needs.

Reasons to Convert from Google Sheets to Excel If you’ve given Google Sheets a try, but want to move back to Excel as your primary spreadsheet program, here are some things to think about and steps to take that can help expedite the process. WorkApps Package your entire business program or project into a WorkApp in minutes.Digital asset management Manage and distribute assets, and see how they perform.Resource management Find the best project team and forecast resourcing needs.Intelligent workflows Automate business processes across systems.Governance & administration Configure and manage global controls and settings.Streamlined business apps Build easy-to-navigate business apps in minutes.Integrations Work smarter and more efficiently by sharing information across platforms.Secure request management Streamline requests, process ticketing, and more.Process management at scale Deliver consistent projects and processes at scale.Content management Organize, manage, and review content production.Workflow automation Quickly automate repetitive tasks and processes.Team collaboration Connect everyone on one collaborative platform.Smartsheet platform Learn how the Smartsheet platform for dynamic work offers a robust set of capabilities to empower everyone to manage projects, automate workflows, and rapidly build solutions at scale.Protecting a Google sheet will not effect the data validation rules. Pasting data in a Google sheet can also bypass data validation and amend the data controlling drop-down lists. Data Validation Not Working in Google Sheets It will also not be available if you are in Group Mode.Ĭlick on one of the individual sheet tabs to remove Group mode and enable Data Validation. In the Ribbon, select Review, Protect > Unshare Workbook to stop sharing the file. It will also not be available if your file is shared. In the Ribbon, select Review, Protect > Unprotect Sheet to remove the Protection. If your worksheet is protected, then the Data Validation option will not be available.

The worksheet could be protected, shared, or grouped. Is the Data Validation button on the Ribbon gray and unclickable? There are three reasons this could happen. Make sure you data for the drop-down list is correct and does not contain any blank cells. In the above drop-down list, there are two blank rows. If your list is amended – i.e., if data is added to the list or removed from the list, then the drop-down list that you need to select the data from may be incorrect.

Make sure your cells are empty, and then set the rule before typing in any data. In the above graphic, setting the rule after the data is already entered will not cause a data validation error. If you set the data validation rule after you have entered the data, then the rule will not apply. In the Ribbon, select Data > Data Validation > Circle Invalid Data. Once you have done this, you can view the invalid data as the data validation rule will remain in place for those cells. The data validation rule would not be removed yet the data would be pasted. Another way would be to use Paste Special to paste values only. One of these would be to write some VBA code. There are a couple of ways to avoid losing the data validation rule when copying and pasting data. Preventing the data validation rule from being removed The validation rule doesn’t kick in unless the data is entered manually. If you copy the data from range H13:H21 and paste into range D15:D23, any data validation rules from Column H now apply to the Ordinary Hours worked column, not the original rules from D15:D23. The cells should not allow an entry greater than 40 into the cell. If you have a validation rule on a range of cells but you then paste data into those cells, you will override the data validation set for those cells.įor example, in the graphic below, there’s a data validation rule set for the range D15:D23. It is not perfect, however, and there are instances when the user can inadvertently enter data that is not allowed. This tutorial will explain why data validation might not be working in Excel and Google Sheets.ĭata validation is used to restrict the values that are allowed to be entered into specific cells in Excel.
