Worksheet in excel not visible

Last Update: Jan 03, 2023

This is a question our experts keep getting from time to time. Now, we have got the complete detailed explanation and answer for everyone, who is interested!

Asked by: Prof. Stanley Spinka

Score: 4.6/5
(31 votes)

The Show sheet tabs setting is turned off. First ensure that the Show sheet tabs is enabled. To do this, For all other Excel versions, click File > Options > Advanced—in under Display options for this workbook—and then ensure that there is a check in the Show sheet tabs box.

How do I see all sheets in Excel?

Excel: Right Click to Show a Vertical Worksheets List

Why Excel file is open but not visible?

However, sometimes when you open a workbook, you see that it is open but you can’t actually see it. This could be as a result of an intentional or accidental hiding of the workbook (as apposed to a sheet). Under the VIEW tab you will see buttons called Hide and Unhide.

Where did my Excel sheet go?

Step 1 — Open Excel, click «File» and then click «Info.» Click the «Manage Versions» button and then choose «Recover Unsaved Workbooks» from the menu. Step 2 — Select the file to restore and then click «Open» to load the workbook. Step 3 — Click the «Save As» button on the yellow bar to recover the worksheet.

How do I view hidden sheets in Excel?

Unhide Worksheets Using the Ribbon

37 related questions found

Ever stuck into such an issue where you can’t see tabs in Excel or sheets not visible in Excel? Looking for some easy tricks to fix Excel tabs not showing issue?

Leave all you worry because, for easy restoration of missing worksheet tabs, this tutorial is surely going to help you a lot. Here you will get the best tricks to overcome the Excel spreadsheets disappeared issue in an easy way.

Apart from that, you will also get an easy idea of how to find hidden worksheets in Excel 2010/2013/2016/2019.

Why Did My Excel Worksheet Disappeared?

Normally, within the Excel workbook, you will get several tabs along with the bottom of the screen. The missing Excel worksheet tab issue mainly generates when sheets may get hidden in plain sight due to some changes in the Excel setting.

In order to solve the mystery of Excel tabs not showing problems let’s first find the answer to why are tabs not showing in Excel? After then follow the workarounds to fix the Excel missing sheet tabs issue.

There are numerous things that will make your Excel sheet disappeared.

Here we have listed some most common causes of Excel sheet tabs missing. Have a Look…

• When you inadvertently disconnect the workbook Windows from Excel. Mainly while using the trio of restore windows buttons on the title bar and moving the Windows under the status bar.
• The screen resolution is done too high and the tab gets vanished from the bottom of the screen.
• You may have turned off the Display options for this workbook.
• The workbook window is sized in a way that the tabs are hidden.
• The tabs get obscure due to the horizontal scroll bar.
• The worksheet itself is hidden.

How To Fix Excel Tabs Not Showing Issue?

Follow the given methods to troubleshoot Excel Tabs Not Showing issue:

1: Change the Zoom Settings

2: Check Show Sheet Tabs Setting Is Turned Off

3: Unhide the Worksheet

4:  Check The Show Sheet Tabs Settings Controls

5: Check Excel Windows Arrangement

6: Click the Navigation Arrow in the Excel File

Now it’s time to discuss each of these methods of fixing Excel Worksheet disappeared in detail. So, let’s get started….!

Watch out this interesting video on how to restore missing Excel worksheet tabs and cells.

Method 1: Change the Zoom Settings

Change the zoom settings to some other settings. Then change the zoom settings back to the preferred settings.

Follow these steps to do this:

• Click the zoom out or zoom in on the status bar.

• On the View tab, click zoom in the zoom group, select the settings you want under Magnification, and then click OK.

Hope by changing the zoom settings you are able to see the missing Excel sheet tabs but if not then follow the method 2

Method 2: Check Show Sheet Tabs Setting Is Turned Off

This might be the case that Excel sheet tabs go missing as the sheet tabs setting is turned off. To verify it, follow the steps to do so:

• Click File > Options > Advanced, then under Display options for this workbook.
• Assure that the Show sheet tab checkbox is selected.

This process is the same for all Excel versions.

Method 3: Unhide the Worksheet

In many cases, the Excel sheet disappeared by itself. So to get the missing sheet tab back you must use the unhide worksheet of Excel.

Follow the steps to do so:

• Right-click on any visible tab on the worksheet > click Unhide
• Then in the Unhide dialog box > click sheet you desire to unhide
• Click Ok.

Method 4:  Check The Show Sheet Tabs Settings Controls

In Excel 2010 and former, it is comparatively easy to unintentionally organize a spreadsheet Window. Subsequently, the worksheet tabs aren’t present on the screen, even if the Show Sheet Tabs option is enabled. While this happens, double click on the workbook’s name to maximize the Window and recover workbooks.

In Excel 2013 if you are not able to see the worksheet tabs, simply double-click on the words “Microsoft Excel” at the top of the Windows for maximizing Excel’s application window.

Method 5: Check Excel Windows Arrangement

In some cases, it is found that Excel Windows get arranged in such a way so that the tabs are not visible.  So check for them. Make use of the keyboard shortcut to navigate between worksheets within the workbook. And to do this, press Ctrl – Page Up for activating the adjacent worksheets to the left and or else press Ctrl- Page Down for activating the next worksheet to the right.

In this activate menu Excel 2013 provides helpful improvements since the entire worksheets are displayed in a single dialog box and after that, you can select a worksheet by entering the first letter of the sheet name.

In Excel 2010 or the earlier version, the Activate menu very first displays up to 16 worksheets and requires selecting more sheets for displaying more lists.

Additionally, in Excel 2010 or the earlier version, you should select the desired sheet name by making use of your mouse. Because the menu cannot be accessed by way of keystrokes as it is possible in Excel 2013.

You can also read: 7 Tricks To Fix Missing Gridlines In Excel Issue

Method 6: Click the Navigation Arrow in the Excel File

In many other cases, it happens that the worksheet tabs are available, but a worksheet still appears missing. In Excel 2007 and later versions, right-click on any worksheet tab and select unhide.

Well, if the command is disabled there is most likely no hidden worksheet is present in the workbook. However, there is still a way you can find out this possibility.

Follow the steps to access the unhide sheet command from Excel’s main menu:

• Excel 2007 and later: Go to the home tab > select format > click hide and unhide sheet.

• Excel 2003 and earlier: Select Format > Sheet > and Unhide.
• And Excel 2011 for Mac: From the main menu > select format option > sheet > unhide. The format command on the home tab of the ribbon doesn’t let you unhide the worksheet.

If the unhide sheet is disabled, you can’t necessarily assume that there are no hidden worksheets within a workbook.

Automatic Solution To Recover Missing/Disappeared Tabs In Excel

Well, if none of the above-mentioned methods help you to recover missing sheets in Excel. Then the chances are high that your Excel sheet has caught into some corruption issue. Due to the corruption of the Excel sheet, you may also find that your Excel sheet content disappeared.

In this case, you can make use of the professional recommended MS Excel Repair Tool.  This is the best tool to repair any sort of issues, corruption as well as errors in Excel files. It also restores the entire data in the preferred location. It is too easy to use.

* Free version of the product only previews recoverable data.

Steps to Utilize MS Excel Repair Tool:

Conclusion:

Hope after reading the article you are able to recover your missing sheet tabs in Excel. I tried my best to provide complete information about how to recover the missing or hidden sheet tabs in Microsoft Excel.

So, now it’s your turn to make use of the given methods to fix Excel tabs not showing the issue. Just go for it.

Good Luck!!!  

This week, while working on a project, I wanted to hide a worksheet in Excel. However, I didn’t want users to unhide it or even know it was there. I wanted to make the Excel sheets very hidden (i.e. invisible to other users).

I’m sure many users know how to hide a sheet. However, most are unaware of the ability to make a sheet very hidden, which makes it invisible.

This post looks at the differences between hidden and very hidden and 6 ways to make sheets very hidden.

What is a very hidden worksheet?

Have you ever used a workbook where a formula refers to a sheet you just can’t find? The sheet is not a tab at the bottom, and is not in the list of hidden sheets. Where could it be?

Look at the screenshot below. You can’t see Sheet2 because it is sheet is very hidden.

Difference between hidden and very hidden sheets

Rightly or wrongly, hidden worksheets are commonly used to:

• Remove workbook clutter – hides the previous versions and workings which are no longer relevant. (In my opinion, it’s better to keep these visible, so you remember to delete them later. Otherwise, the clutter builds up in the background).
• Hide workings from users – users don’t need to see workings to be able to use a spreadsheet. Hiding is an excellent way to focus attention on what is required.
• Provide basic protection – prevents users from accidentally changing things that might break the spreadsheet.

Hiding a sheet is available in the standard user interface. There are lots of options to hide a sheet:

• From the ribbon:
  • Click View > Hide
  • Click Home > Format > Hide & Unhide > Hide Sheet
• Right-click the sheet tab and select Hide from the menu

Since many users know about hidden sheets, they can just as easily unhide them.

• From the ribbon, Click Home > Format > Hide & Unhide > Unhide sheets…
• Right-click a visible sheet and select Unhide from the menu

In the Unhide dialog box, select the sheet and click OK.

Note: In Excel 365 and Excel 2021 and later, we can unhide multiple sheets; prior to that, it had to be performed for each sheet individually.

Very hidden sheets can be used for the same purpose as hidden. But, the special thing about very hidden sheets is they do not appear in the Unhide list. So, for example, in the screenshot at the start, we could see a formula using Sheet2, but that sheet was nowhere to be found; it was very hidden.

OK, so let’s take a look at 6 ways to make Excel sheets very hidden.

In this section, we provide 6 ways to make worksheets very hidden. We’re looking at options for Excel Desktop and Excel Online,

Do you have the Developer tab enabled?

The first three methods require the Developer tab to be enabled. To do this:

1. Right-click on an empty ribbon section and select Customize the Ribbon… from the menu.
2. The Excel Options dialog box opens.
3. Ensure the Developer option is checked, then click OK.

You should now have the Developer tab visible in the ribbon.

Worksheet Properties

The first method for making worksheets very hidden uses the Control Properties dialog box.

1. From the ribbon, click Developer > Properties
2. The Properties dialog box opens. Change the Visible setting from -1 – xlSheetVisible to 2 – xlSheetVeryHidden
3. The change is applied instantly, and the workbook disappears

Test it out. You will notice the worksheet does not appear in the unhide list.

This method can only be applied to the active sheet, and must be used on a sheet-by-sheet basis.

Now the worksheet is hiddenm we cannot activate it. So we cannot use this method to make the worksheet visible again. For that, we can use another method.

VBA Properties

The second method is similar to the first, but uses an alternative interface. The good news is we can use this method to make any very hidden worksheets visible again.

For this, we need to open the Visual Basic Editor.

1. Click Developer > Visual Basic (or press Alt + F11)
2. The Visual Basic Editor opens
3. If the Properties window in the bottom-left is not open, click View > Properties from the VBA menu
4. In the Project window, select the sheet to be hidden
5. Then, in the Properties window, change the visible property from -1 – xlSheetVisible to 2 – xlSheetVeryHidden

To make a worksheet visible again, change the setting to -1 – xlSheetVisible.

Run a VBA Macro

The previous methods were all manual. So, let’s move on now to look at more automated methods.

The following are example VBA codes for making sheets very hidden (and making them visible again 😁). We won’t go into how to use the VBA code in detail. If you are using these methods, I assume you already know how to run macros.

Very hide the active worksheet

The code below hides the active worksheet of the active workbook.

Sub activeWorksheetVeryHide()

'Very hide the active worksheet
ActiveSheet.Visible = xlSheetVeryHidden

End Sub

Very hidden worksheets cannot be active; check out other methods below to make the worksheet visible again.

Very hide a named worksheet

The following code makes Sheet1 of the workbook containing the VBA code visible.

Sub namedWorksheetVeryHide()

'Very hide a named worksheet in the workbook
ThisWorkbook.Sheets("Sheet1").Visible = xlSheetVeryHidden

End Sub

Having made the worksheet very hidden, to make it visible again, use the following code.

Sub namedWorksheetVisible()

'Make the named worksheet in the workbook visible
ThisWorkbook.Sheets("Sheet1").Visible = xlSheetVisible

End Sub

Very hide all selected worksheets

The following code makes the selected worksheets in the active workbook very hidden.

Sub allSelectedWorksheetsVeryHide()

'Create variable to hold worksheets
Dim ws As Worksheet

'Loop through each selected worksheet
For Each ws In ActiveWindow.SelectedSheets

    'Very hide the worksheets
    ws.Visible = xlSheetVeryHidden

Next ws

End Sub

Once the worksheets are hidden, they are no longer selected. Therefore, look at the methods below to make multiple worksheets visible again.

Very hide a list of worksheets

To make multiple named worksheets very hidden, use the code below. This code will very hide Sheet1 and Sheet2 in the workbook which contains the VBA code.

Sub namedWorksheetsVeryHide()

Dim sheetList As Variant
Dim i As Integer

'Get the list of sheet names to very hide
sheetList = "Sheet1|Sheet2"

'Split the list into an array
sheetList = Split(sheetList, "|")

'Loop through each item in the array
For i = LBound(sheetList) To UBound(sheetList)

    'Very hide a named worksheet in the workbook
    ThisWorkbook.Sheets(sheetList(i)).Visible = xlSheetVeryHidden

Next i

End Sub

Very hide all worksheets except the active sheet

It is not possible to hide all worksheets, as Excel requires at least one visible sheet. The following code hides all except the active sheet.

Sub allExceptActiveWorksheetVeryHide()

Dim activeWs As Worksheet
Dim ws As Worksheet

'Declare the active worksheet
Set activeWs = ActiveSheet

'Loop through each worksheet in the active workbook
For Each ws In ActiveWorkbook.Worksheets

    'Check if the worksheet is the active worksheet
    If ws.Name <> activeWs.Name Then
        
        'Hide the worksheet
        ws.Visible = xlSheetVeryHidden
    
    End If

Next ws

End Sub

Make all very hidden worksheets visible

This final code will make all very hidden worksheets visible again.

Sub allVeryHiddenWorksheetsVisible()

'Create variable to hold worksheets
Dim ws As Worksheet

'Loop through each worksheet
For Each ws In ActiveWorkbook.Worksheets

    'Check if the worksheet is alrady very hidden
    If ws.Visible = xlSheetVeryHidden Then
    
        'Very hide the worksheets
        ws.Visible = xlSheetVisible
    
    End If

Next ws

End Sub

For more VBA code examples for working with worksheets, check out this post: https://exceloffthegrid.com/worksheet-properties-actions/

Office Scripts

Excel Online does not support VBA Macros; instead, it has its own automation language called Office Scripts. If you are using this method, I am assuming you already know how to run Office Scripts.

Very hide the active worksheet

The following script very hides the active worksheet of the active workbook.

function main(workbook: ExcelScript.Workbook) {

//Very hide the active worksheet
workbook.getActiveWorksheet().
  setVisibility(ExcelScript.SheetVisibility.veryHidden)

}

Since very hidden sheets cannot be active, look at the examples below for making a worksheet visible again.

Very hide a named worksheet

The following code makes Sheet1 of the active workbook very hidden.

function main(workbook: ExcelScript.Workbook) {

//Very hide the named worksheet
workbook.getWorksheet("Sheet1").
  setVisibility(ExcelScript.SheetVisibility.veryHidden)

}

Use the code below to make Sheet1 visible again.

function main(workbook: ExcelScript.Workbook) {

workbook.getWorksheet("Sheet1").
  setVisibility(ExcelScript.SheetVisibility.visible)

}

Very hide a list of worksheets

The example below makes Sheet1 and Sheet2 of the active workbook very hidden.

function main(workbook: ExcelScript.Workbook) {

//List of sheets to very hide
let sheetList = "Sheet1|Sheet2"

//Convert sheetList to an Array
let sheetArray = sheetList.split("|");

//Loop through all items in the sheetList
for (let i = 0; i < sheetArray.length; i++) {

  //Very hide the worksheet
  workbook.getWorksheet(sheetArray[i]).
    setVisibility(ExcelScript.SheetVisibility.veryHidden)

}

}

Very hide all worksheets except the active sheet

Excel must have at least one sheet visible. Therefore, the code below hides all except the active sheet.

function main(workbook: ExcelScript.Workbook) {

//Get the active worksheet
let activeWs = workbook.getActiveWorksheet();

//Loop through all worksheets
for (let i = 0; i < workbook.getWorksheets().length; i++) {

  //Check if worksheets is the activeworksheet
  if (workbook.getWorksheets()[i].getName() != activeWs.getName() ) {

    //Very hide the worksheet
    workbook.getWorksheets()[i].
      setVisibility(ExcelScript.SheetVisibility.veryHidden)

  }

}

}

Make all very hidden worksheets visible

The code below snippet makes all very hidden worksheets visible. It does not change the status of any hidden worksheets.

function main(workbook: ExcelScript.Workbook) {

//Get an array of all the worksheets
let wsArray = workbook.getWorksheets();

  //Loop through the array of worksheets
  for (let i = 0; i < wsArray.length; i++) {

    //Check if worksheets are very hidden
    if (wsArray[i].getVisibility() == "VeryHidden") {

      //Make worksheet visible
      wsArray[i].setVisibility(ExcelScript.SheetVisibility.visible)

    }

}

}

For more Office Script code examples for worksheets, check out this post: https://exceloffthegrid.com/office-scripts-working-with-worksheets/

Hide all sheet tabs

There is an option in Excel desktop to hide worksheet tabs. This option does not change the visibility of the worksheets; they are still visible. However, without the ability to use the tabs, this may prevent users from knowing a sheet exists (effectively the same result as making them very hidden).

1. Click File > Options from the ribbon to open the Excel Options dialog box
2. In the Advanced section, uncheck the Show sheet tabs option.
3. Click OK to close the dialog box.

The sheet tabs are no longer visible in Excel desktop.

The VBA code to toggle this option is:

Sub toggleSheetTabs()

'Toggle worksheet tabs on/off
ActiveWindow.DisplayWorkbookTabs = Not ActiveWindow.DisplayWorkbookTabs

End Sub

Note: Excel Online does not support this feature. The tabs will be visible if the workbook is opened in Excel Online.

Changing file structure

This final method is quite a niche option. But you never know when it might come in useful. We are going to unpack the Excel workbook and change the source code.

Before attempting this, please back up the Excel file, as any mistakes may corrupt the file.

1. Rename the Excel workbook so the file extension is .zip, instead of .xlsx
2. Navigate into the zip file and find the file called xlworkbook.xml
3. Copy and paste the file outside of the zip folder
4. Open the file using a text editor like Notepad
5. Within the code, you will find code similar to the following
   <sheet name=”Sheet2″ sheetId=”2″ r:id=”rId2″/>
   In that code, we can add the statement to make a sheet very hidden (see the bold section below)
   <sheet name=”Sheet2″ sheetId=”2″ state=”veryHidden” r:id=”rId2″/>
6. Save the file with the additional code. Then, copy and paste the file back into the xl zip folder.
7. Accept the option to replace the file.
8. Change the file extension of the zip file back to .xlsx.

On opening the workbook, you will find the sheet is now very hidden.

Are hidden sheets completely invisible?

A common question about this is: Are hidden sheets completely invisible?

Hopefully, having read this far, you will realize the answer is: No. The methods shown above to make sheets visible are available to other users too. However, most users don’t know about these techniques. Even if they do, they still need to care enough to look for the very hidden sheets.

Conclusion

As we have seen, there are many ways to make Excel sheets invisible (very hidden). With a bit of knowledge, it is not a difficult task.

We can to use the Developer tab, and the Visual Basic Editor to apply the setting manually. But if this is an action you perform regularly, you may prefer the automated options using VBA and Office Scripts.

Have we missed any methods? Please let us know in the comments.

The default setting in Excel is to show all the tabs (also called sheets) below the working area.

But if you can’t see any tabs and are wondering where has it disappeared, worry not. There are some possible reasons that may have been the cause of missing tabs in your Excel workbook.

In this article, I will show you a couple of methods you can use to restore the missing tabs in your Excel Workbook.

If you can’t see any of the tab names, it is most likely because of a setting that needs to be changed.

And in case you can see some of the sheet tabs but not all the sheet tabs, one possible reason could be that the sheets have been hidden, and you need to unhide the sheets to make the sheet tabs visible.

Another less likely but possible reason could be that the scrollbar he’s hiding the sheet tabs (when there are more sheets that extends beyond where the scrollbar starts)

Let’s have a look at each of these scenarios.

When All the Sheet Tabs are Missing

Whenever you open an Excel workbook, it must have at least one sheet tab in it (even if it’s a new blank workbook).

If you can’t see any tab, this most likely means that you need to change a setting that will enable the visibility of the tabs.

Below are the steps to restore the visibility of the tabs in Excel:

1. Click the File tab

1. Click on Options

1. In the ‘Options’ dialog box that opens, click on the Advanced option

1. Scroll down to the ‘Display Options for this Workbook’ section
2. Check the ‘Show sheet tabs’ option

The above change would ensure that all the available sheet tabs in the workbook become visible (unless the user has specifically hidden some of the worksheets)

Note that this setting is workbook specific – which means that in case you enable this setting in one of the workbooks, it would only make the tabs reappear in that specific workbook

When Some of the Sheet Tabs are Missing

Sometimes, you may be able to see some of the tabs in the workbook, while some others may be missing.

In this section, I have some solutions when only some of the tabs are missing and some are visible.

Some of the Sheets are Hidden

The most likely reason that you cannot see some of the tabs in the workbook is that they have been hidden by the user.

When a worksheet is hidden in Excel, it continues to exist as a part of the Excel workbook, but you don’t see that sheet tab name along with other sheet tabs.

And this has a really simple solution – you need to unhide the sheets.

Below are the steps to unhide one or more sheets in Excel:

1. Right-click on any of the existing sheet tab name
2. Click on the Unhide option. In case there are no hidden sheets in the workbook, this option will be grayed out

1. In the Unhide dialog box, click on the sheet name you want to unhide

1. Click on OK

The above steps would unhide the selected sheet, and it would reappear as a tab in your workbook.

In case you want to unhide multiple sheets, you can select them in one go in the ‘Unhide’ dialog box. To do this, hold the Control key (or Command key if using Mac) and then click on the Sheet names that you want to unhide. This would select all the sheets on which you click and then you can unhide all these with one click.

But what if you do not see the tab name in the names listed in the Unhide dialog box?

Well, there is a way in Excel to hide a sheet in such a way that its name doesn’t show up in the Unhide dialog box.

Then how do you unhide these ‘very hidden’ sheets?

You can read my tutorial here where I show you how to unhide those sheets that have been ‘very hidden’. It’s easy and it will only take a couple of clicks.

Tabs are Hidden Because of the Scroll Bar

Another reason your tabs may be missing could be because of a large scroll bar that hides the tabs.

And it has a simple fix – resize the scroll bar to make all other tabs visible.

Below I have a screenshot of an Excel workbook where I have 8 sheets but only three sheet tabs are visible. This is because of a large scrollbar that hides those tab names.

To get the sheet tabs to reappear, click on the three dots icon on the left of the scrollbar and drag it to the right. This will minimize the scroll bar and all the sheet tabs that were earlier hidden would now become visible.

In case you have a large workbook with a lot of sheets, even if you minimize the scrollbar, some sheet tabs would still be hidden.

In such a case, you can use the navigation icons (which are at the left of the first sheet tab) to make those sheet tabs visible.

So these are some of the ways you can use to fix the issue when the sheet tabs are missing and not showing in Excel. If you don’t see any sheet tab in the workbook, it’s most likely because of the setting in the Excel Options dialog box that needs to be changed.

And in case you see some sheet tab names but some are missing, then you need to check if some of the sheets have been hidden by the user or if they are hidden because of a large scroll bar.

Other Excel tutorials you may also like:

• Microsoft Excel Won’t Open – How to Fix it! (6 Possible Solutions)
• How to Switch Between Sheets in Excel? (7 Better Ways)
• Count Sheets in Excel (using VBA)
• How to Get the Sheet Name in Excel? Easy Formula
• How to Insert New Worksheet in Excel (Easy Shortcuts)
• How to Delete Sheets in Excel (Shortcuts + VBA)
• Arrow Keys not Working in Excel | Moving Pages Instead of Cells
• How to Change the Color of the Sheet Tab in Excel

Did you know that Excel has two levels of hidden worksheets?  Excel has “hidden” worksheets, and, “very hidden” worksheets. This post walks through the differences, and how to hide worksheets at each level.

By default, all new worksheets are visible.  A visible worksheet’s tab appears in the bottom of the Excel window, enabling the user to click the tab in order to navigate to the worksheet.  Easy enough, let’s move on.

Visible Property

In the real world, an object is either visible or it is not.  For example, Harry Potter is typically visible.  However, when he throws on that sweet cloak of invisibility, he is not visible.  His visible status changes to false.  In the real world, the visible status of an object is either true or false, it is either visible or it is not.  In Excel however, the visible property of a worksheet object has three possible values: true, false, or….very hidden.

Hidden

When a worksheet has a visible property value of true, it is visible and can be seen and selected by the user.  When a worksheet has a visible property of false, it is hidden, and can no longer be seen from within the standard Excel user interface.  That is, the sheet’s tab is gone.  The sheet itself however, is not gone, and formulas can still retrieve values stored on a hidden sheet.  It just disappears from the user interface.

It is pretty easy to hide a sheet.  Although, if we are trying to be technical, we should say it this way: it is pretty easy to change a worksheet’s visible property from true to false.

All five worksheets in my workbook are visible in the following screenshot.

To hide a sheet, simply right-click the sheet’s tab and select hide.  You can also hide a sheet using the following ribbon command:

• Home > Format > Hide & Unhide > Hide Worksheet

You can also hide a sheet using the following keyboard shortcut:

• Alt+o, h, h

Sheet2 is hidden in my workbook, as shown in the screenshot below:

To unhide a sheet, simply right-click any sheet’s tab and select Unhide.  This reveals the Unhide dialog box as shown below.

Pick the hidden sheet and click ok.  You can also unhide a sheet using the following ribbon command:

• Home > Format > Hide & Unhide > Unhide Worksheet

You can also unhide a sheet using the following keyboard shortcut:

• Alt+o, h, u

Now, here is where it gets fun, creating very hidden sheets.

Very Hidden

The third property value is very hidden.  The difference between a hidden sheet and a very hidden sheet is simply this: very hidden sheets do not appear in the Unhide dialog box.

Now, before we get to the mechanics of how to set a sheet’s property to very hidden, let me set up a bit of background that will be useful.  First, we need to understand that in Excel, there is a world outside of the typical Excel user interface.  What you see when navigating inside the Excel application window is a subset of everything available in Excel.  A primary example is macros.  Macros are not edited within the standard interface, they are edited within a utility application called the Visual Basic Editor (VBE).  The VBE is a powerful and useful utility, and Excel power users spend quite a bit of time in it.  It is inside the VBE where we change the visible property of a worksheet to very hidden.  Here is how the VBE refers to the Visible property values:

• True = xlSheetVisible
• False = xlSheetHidden
• Very Hidden = xlSheetVeryHidden

You still with me?  Great, let’s get into the VBE now.

Visual Basic Editor

There are a couple of different ways to open the VBE.  You could use either of the following keyboard shortcut:

• Alt+F11
• Alt+t, m, v

Or, if you are more of a ribbon person, you could use the following ribbon command:

• Developer > Visual Basic  [Note: Microsoft does not ship Excel with the Developer ribbon tab visible, so, you’ll need to turn it on.  In Excel 2010/2013: customize the ribbon and check the Developer tab.  In Excel 2007: go into options and check the “Show developer tab in ribbon” checkbox]

At this point, you should have the VBE open, and it should look a little something like the screenshot below.

In the top left panel is the Project Explorer, where you can use the tree to navigate to any open workbook, and to any sheet.  Double-click the sheet you want to update.

[Note: if you don’t see the Project Explorer, simply select View > Project Explorer]

Then, you’ll be able to view and change the status of the Visible property in the Properties window.

[Note: if you don’t see the Properties window, simply select View > Properties Window]

On the Visible property, use the combo box to change the value to xlSheetVeryHidden, or, to either of the other options.

In the screenshot below, I selected xlSheetVeryHidden from the Visible property combo box:

Once you return to Excel, you’ll notice that the sheet’s tab is not visible.  You’ll also notice that if the workbook contains very hidden sheets, the user won’t have an option to open the Unhide dialog box.  If the workbook contains both hidden and very hidden sheets, then the user can open the Unhide dialog box, however, the very hidden sheets do not appear.  In my workbook, Sheet2 is very hidden, and Sheet3 is hidden, and the Unhide dialog box is shown in the screenshot below.

Wow, Sheet2 is very hidden!

If you want to view the sheet again, simply change the property from xlSheetVeryHidden to xlSheetVisible from within the VBE and you’ll be all set.

Now, with great power comes great responsibility, so use this super power with great care!

Hiding worksheets in Excel and changing their visibility state is a useful tool with many practical applications.  There are a few ways you can go about hiding Excel worksheets and there are also a couple of variants that every Excel analyst would be wise to know, read on to learn more…

Hiding Worksheets in Excel

There are many reasons why you could consider hiding a worksheet in one of your Excel files, for example:

• Hiding a worksheet, or multiple worksheets, can make your Excel file easier for the client, manager or other user(s) to understand. It can help focus their attention on the key worksheets in the file rather than feeling overwhelmed by a lot of different worksheets that either have no information on them or information that is not important.
• Hiding a worksheet can be practical when it contains lookups or reference data that is used to create other worksheets but is not something the end user(s) necessarily needs to see.
• Hiding a worksheet can help prevent unauthorised or accidental changes to your file. As with above if you have a worksheet containing reference data hiding that sheet can stop other users changing the information and potentially ruining the file.  For additional protection you would need to adopt some form of password protection but often just hiding a worksheet can be enough if your end-users are not Excel savvy.

It is important to note that hiding worksheets in Excel does not remove them from the file, they are still active and can be referenced on any of the visible worksheets.  For example you can write a formula on a visible worksheet that links to a cell on a hidden worksheet.  All you are doing is hiding the worksheets from view.

Visibility States in Excel

There are three visibility states a worksheet can be in within your Excel file:

1. Visible: Everyone can see the worksheet when the file is open.
2. Hidden: The worksheet is not visible but can be easily unhidden with a couple of mouse clicks.
3. Very Hidden: The worksheet is not visible and requires the user to go into the Visual Basic Editor in order to unhide it. Most Excel users will not understand how to do this and even more security can be added with password protection if you want to stop the more advanced Excel users from having access to the Worksheet(s) you have hidden.

How to Hide a Worksheet in Excel

There are a few ways to change a worksheets visibility:

1. Manually Hide or Unhide the Excel worksheet
2. Use the Visual Basic Editor to change the state of the Excel Worksheet
3. Write VBA Script to Hide or Unhide the Excel worksheet

The first two methods will be the most common ones that you use.  The VBA scripting only becomes useful when it forms part of a larger script that you are running, for example running several different processes in your script that ends with hiding some worksheets in the end result.

Let’s look at each of the three methods in more detail:

Method One: Manually Hide the Excel Worksheet

This is by far the quickest method although it can be easily undone by any Excel users that have a grasp of the fundamentals.

First right-click on the worksheet name you wish to hide and then in the pop-up window select Hide, as shown below:

To make the sheet visible again, or Unhide worksheets if you are using an already created file, right-click on one of the visible worksheet names then click on “Unhide” from the pop-up window.  This will make any worksheets that are hidden visible again.

This method is useful for tidying up Excel files and is one of the most common methods used.  It is important to remember that it is easy for anyone to Hide or Unhide a worksheet this way so if you need a little extra security I suggest the next method.

Method Two: Use the Visual Basic Editor to change the state of the Excel Worksheet

This method is still very quick and because it gives you access to the actual worksheet state it is more powerful as you can fully hide the worksheet using Excels “very hidden” function.

First open the Visual Basic Editor; this can be opened by the shortcut command ALT+F11:

As highlighted in the above image of the VBA Editor the two main areas are:

1. VBA Project Window: This is where you select the worksheet that you want to change the state of and Hide. Left-Click on the Sheet name that you want to change and it will highlight in blue to show it has been selected.
2. VBA Properties Window: After you have selected the worksheet you can change the properties of that worksheet in this window. The last category in the window is called “Visible” and when you left-click on that box you can use the drop down arrow to change the state of the Worksheet.

The three options are:

1. XlSheetVisible: Selecting this means the worksheet will be visible to all users.
2. XlSheetHidden: This replicates manually hiding the worksheet so it will disappear from view but can be easily Unhidden by other users using the manual method of Hiding/Unhiding worksheets.
3. XlSheetVeryHidden: This option is the most secure way to hide the worksheet and mainly it is very useful when you have an Excel worksheet that contains reference data that you do not want changed. The only way to reverse this choice is to go back into the Visual Basic Editor and change this option to XlSheetVisible and many Excel users will not be aware of how to do this, they will likely never know the worksheet even exists!

Method Three: Write VBA Script to hide the Excel worksheet

The final method to hide an Excel worksheet is to use VBA Script.  It is overkill to write VBA script solely to change the state of a worksheet but there are occasions where you may have a larger piece of VBA script that will need to Hide or Unhide worksheets during part of the processing.  The code to change between the three visibility states is below:

To hide a worksheet named Sheet1 then use:

1

Worksheets("Sheet1").Visible = False

To unhide a worksheet named Sheet1 then use:

1

Worksheets("Sheet1").Visible = True

To make a worksheet named Sheet1 Very Hidden then use:

1

Worksheets("Sheet1").Visible = xlVeryHidden

Summary

This post covered a fair amount of detail on the three visibility states of a worksheet looking at the three visibility states:

• Visible
• Hidden
• Very Hidden

Along with teaching the three methods you can use for changing the visibility of a worksheet:

• Manually (Hide and Unhide only)
• Via the VBA Editor
• Via VBA Script

Hopefully that has provided you with a good knowledge of how Excel worksheets can be Hidden or Unhidden to suit your needs.

Keep Excelling,

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