Excel Files won't open in Outlook 2007

[dave@at]

I am using Outlook as my default email client. I receive a tons of files in the attachment. Most of them are excel sheet. When I double click on any excel sheet in the mail it does not open. There is nothing on the screen. While in my office pc when I do the same excel opens automatically and I can modify the file. I cannot find any reason behind the problem. Does there are some settings that would allow me to do the same.

[Cristy5]

I have the exact same problem. Except I cannot right click in the blank window and get the spreadsheet to open, even saving to the desktop does not allow me to open it. I have not been able to find a fix anywhere, but if I find the solution, I will post it ASAP. I found an answer that fixed my issue after many weeks of trying. Open Excel 2007, open the spreadsheet you are having problems with, click on the "View" tab, click on "Arrange all" button, make sure that "Tiled" is checked and say ok. You must save the worksheet to be able to view it again. Hope this helps, it is only a work around, but at least there is something. Let me know if this doesn't fix your problem and I will try to help more. Thanks I have the same problem exactly on XP. I can right click/cancel and the file opens. It takes an incredibly long time to open however when clicking an attachement that someone sent in Outlook in .xls or .xlsx format. Approximately a minute before Excel even opens. Clearly it's not desirable. When this happens, changing the view menu is not really practical so if anyone finds another solution to this bug please let me know. I've also unchecked the "Ignore other applications that use DDL" button as others have suggested, to no avail.I went into Excel Options -> Add-Ins and turned on the Analysis Toolpack add-ins (2). This allowed the attachments to fire up almost immediately.

[IRVING]

Just go inside control panel and simply locate program access default. There you can configure the type of application to open for the file extension and it will work well. Once it is restored when you click on the file attached it open automatically in Excel. You can try that and then tell us if you are facing more issue.

[angiec]

I had some of those same issues. With the Excel file not opening in 2007, I went to the View menu in Excel and noticed that the Unhide option was active, when I clicked it, it "unhid" the document. For some reason it set itself to open the document in Hide mode. Once I did that the first time, it stopped opening documents in that fashion.

For the attachments opening very slowly, or not at all, you can try this:

Open My Computer
Go to Tools Then Folder options
Select the File Types Tab
Scroll down to the .XLS extension Highlight it
Select the Advance Button
Highlight Open
Select Edit
Where it says "Application used to perform action: Put your cursor in that box and scroll all the way to the end and type in the following "%1" with the quotations. Uncheck the Use DDE box.

Do the same for .XSLX, .DOC, and .DOCX

[upapink]

The solution that worked for us is: go to Internet Explorer, Tools, Delete Browsing History, Delete All, then check the "Delete Files and Settings Stored By AddOns". If we did not check this, the open still did not work. But once we checked this, the Excel files would open properly. (we tried all the other suggestions first and nothing else worked.)

One of my users had a similar problem with Outlook 2007 not being able to open or preview a specific excel file. She was unable to open an attachment that she receives daily as an attachment from a customer. The excel attachment file name is always the same. Looks like Outlook has some sort of maximum temp file with same name and won't open anymore files with this name once it reaches the maximum. Problem was solved by cleaning up the following folder:

%drive%:\Documents and Settings\%user%\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\Content.Outlook\XXXXXXXX

wherre XXXXXXXX is an 8 character random name.

You might not be able to find the folder by browsing with windows explorer but you can paste the following link in Start-Run (don't forget to change the drive letter and username):
%drive%:\Documents and Settings\%user%\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\Content.Outlook\
This will open a windows explorer window and you will find the random name temp subfolder there.

[stratus99]

Okay, I've tried everything mentioned here, including reinstalling office 2007, to no avail. Excel attachments still fail to open when double clicking the attachment in outlook, there is no previewer available within outlook to preview the excel file attachments and when I right click to save the file elsewhere it fails to save the files. any clues, suggestions or hints. THanks

[riktin007]

This worked perfectly!!! Thank you for having this posted!!!

[sdbrooks]

Not sure if folks are still stuggling with this, but forget excel .. go to outlook 2007, Tools-->Trust center-->add-ins--> at the bottom of the screen select "COM Add-ins" then click GO .. disable or enable any add-in listed. close outlook and restart .. reverse the add-in you changed ... close outlook, restart outlook and you will be working once again. good luck

[AeroJim71]

Although none of the prior suggestions worked in my case, the following did: Open Excel, select the Windows icon at the upper left, then click on Excel Options at the bottom of the dropdown menu. Click on Advanced, and then scroll down in the window to the General heading. Then uncheck the box "Ignore other applications that use dynamic Data Exchange (DDE)". Close Excel, go back to Outlook and double-click on the attachment.

[shahiedl]

Thanks AeroJim. Your solution worked for me in Excel 2010

[gofortheride]

Although none of the prior suggestions worked in my case, the following did: Open Excel, select the Windows icon at the upper left, then click on Excel Options at the bottom of the dropdown menu. Click on Advanced, and then scroll down in the window to the General heading. Then uncheck the box "Ignore other applications that use dynamic Data Exchange (DDE)". Close Excel, go back to Outlook and double-click on the attachment.

THANK YOU AEROJIM71. AFTER TRYING MOST OF THE PRIOR APPROACHES, THIS WORKED FOR ME TOO. I CAN'T IMAGINE HOW YOU EVER FIGURED THIS OUT, BUT I'M VERY GRATEFUL THAT YOU DID!

[silver_swords]

Although none of the prior suggestions worked in my case, the following did: Open Excel, select the Windows icon at the upper left, then click on Excel Options at the bottom of the dropdown menu. Click on Advanced, and then scroll down in the window to the General heading. Then uncheck the box "Ignore other applications that use dynamic Data Exchange (DDE)". Close Excel, go back to Outlook and double-click on the attachment.

Thank you ever so much, AeroJim71. This worked!! I've been trying to figure this out for so long... and I can't for the life of me make it work! I was stumped!

[Seattle Suzanne]

Thank you AeroJim71 (post #9). After struggling for probably a year now to find a fix for this issue, yours is the only solution that worked. And it had no negative consequences, which is huge. Don't know how you arrived at this solution. If you revisit this site, please consider letting us know. Thank you so much!!!

[techdummie]

Thank Post #9 and #11. This definitely worked.

[SuzH]

Thanks a million AeroJim71! You saved my day....Works perfectly now. :)