And if I further go in the xl folder and then go in the worksheet folder, it shows me the worksheets in that workbook (and these worksheets are saved as an XML document).

Sometimes, its easy to get rid of the extra flab and keep the excel file size in check, and sometimes, it isnt.

And since Excel is not a web-based tool, most of us work and collaborate by sending Excel files via email.

And a large Excel file that weighs 50 MB can be hard to share with your colleaguesclients.

In my last job, we used Lotus Notes email client, which is snail-slow, and sending heavy Excel files over that was torture.

While there is no magical way to reduce the size of an Excel workbook, there are a few techniques that you can use to cut down some flab.

Note: The impact of these techniques to reduce Excel file size would depend on your data.

For some, it may help reduce the size by 50 and for some, it may only end up reducing the size by 5.

This Tutorial Covers: Tips to Reduce Excel File Size Remove Unnecessary WorksheetsData Convert to Binary Format (XLSB) What is XLSB XLSB Vs XLSXXLSM Remove Unnecessary Formulas Compress Images (Before and After Uploading) Remove Pivot Cache to Save Space Keep the Source Data and Delete Pivot Cache Keep the Pivot Cache and Delete the Source Data Compress the File (ZIP IT) Remove Data formatting Remove Conditional formatting Excel Performance Booster Tips Tips to Reduce Excel File Size Below are the techniques you can use to reduce the file size of your Excel workbook.

For each tip, I have done some testing and have added the snapshots to show you the impact on file size.

The results you get would vary depending upon your data and files.

Remove Unnecessary WorksheetsData The best solutions are often the easiest ones.

And this technique is more of common sense and less of any Excel wizardry.

If you have an Excel workbook that has some worksheets that are not needed (and are not being used in any formulas ), see if you can get rid of those.

So as soon as you delete some of the worksheets and save the workbook, you will instantly see a reduced file size.

Test Results: I created an Excel file with 10 worksheets where each worksheet has 2.6 million data points (26 columns with 100,000 data points in each column).

The resulting size of this workbook is 143 MB (and its taking quite some time to save and open).

Now when I deleted five sheets, the size reduced by half (duh).

As you can see, data that you have your worksheet has a direct correlation with the file size.

Convert to Binary Format (XLSB) Do you know that just by saving an Excel file in the XLSB format can reduce the file size Yes, its true.

All you have to do is while saving a workbook, use the.xlsb format.

Here are the steps to do this: Click the File tab.

Click on Save As.

Click on Browse. In the Save As dialog box, change the file type to Excel Binary Workbook (.xlsb) Test Results I had an Excel workbook that took 14.6 MB of space.

After converting the same file to the XLSB format, I was able to reduce the size to 10.4 MB (a size reduction of 28).

What is XLSB When you save an Excel file (.xlsx or.xlsm), it gets saved in the XML format.

For example, if I change the file extension of the XLSX file to ZIP and then open it, this is what I get.

Excel File Type To Save In For Mac