Move or Copy sheet is a very useful feature in Excel. You can move or copy worksheets by using this feature. But, sometimes you may face a situation when the Move or Copy sheet is not working. The objective of this article is to explain the reasons why the Move or Copy sheet is not working in Excel with solutions.
Move or Copy Sheet in Excel Is Not Working: 2 Reasons with Solutions
To explain this article, I have taken the following dataset. This dataset contains Employee Information. I named this Excel sheet “Dataset”. I have a few more sheets in this workbook.
Here, I have another Excel sheet named “Contact Information”. I will use these sheets to explain this article.
Reason-01: Having Excel Table in Grouped Worksheets
If you have one or more tables in the grouped worksheet you will not be able to Move or Copy the grouped worksheet. Let me show you the problem in detail.
Steps:
- Press and hold the Ctrl key and select the Excel sheets you want to move.
- Right-click on the selected worksheets.
- Select Move or Copy.
- Then, the Move or Copy dialog box will appear.
- Select where you want to move the worksheets. Here, I selected (move to end).
- After that, check the Create a copy option.
- Next, select OK.
- Here, you will see a warning will appear. The reason behind this is I have a table in the selected worksheets.
- Select OK to remove the warning.
Read More: How to Copy a Sheet to Another Sheet in Excel
Solution: Copy Single Worksheet at a Time
To solve this problem you can copy a single worksheet at a time. You will have to handle the worksheet that contains the table singly. Then, you can move the other sheets group-wise. Let’s see the steps.
Steps:
- In the beginning, right-click on the sheet name tab where the table is.
- Then, select Move or Copy.
- Next, the Move or Copy dialog box will appear.
- Then, select where you want to copy or move the worksheet. Here, I selected (move to end).
- Afterward, check the Create a copy option if you want to copy the worksheet.
- Further, select OK.
- Now, you will see that you have copied the Excel sheet and moved it to your desired location.
- After that, copy the other worksheets in the same way.
Reason-02: Moving or Copying Worksheets in Protected Workbook
Another reason for the Move or Copy sheet not working in Excel is moving or copying worksheets in a protected workbook. In this case, when you try to move a sheet in Excel, you will see that the Move or Copy option is blurred out.
To check this, go to the Review tab from the ribbon, and then you will see that the Protect Workbook command is selected.
Read More: How to Copy Multiple Sheets to New Workbook in Excel
Solution: Unprotect Workbook
You can solve this problem easily by unprotecting the workbook. Let’s see how you can do it.
Steps:
- Go to the Review tab.
- Click on Protect Workbook.
- After that, you will see that the Protect Workbook is not selected anymore.
- Then, right-click on the sheet name tab where the table is.
- Next, select Move or Copy.
- Afterward, the Move or Copy dialog box will appear.
- Next, select where you want to copy or move the worksheet. Here, I selected (move to end).
- Then, check the Create a copy option if you want to copy the worksheet.
- Select OK.
- Finally, you will see that you have copied the worksheet and moved it to your desired location.
How to Move or Copy Sheet to Another Workbook Without Reference in Excel
In this section, I will show you how you can move or copy a sheet to another workbook without reference in Excel. For this example, I have taken another Excel workbook named “Salary_Information”. Here, I have created a sheet named “Salary Information”.
I will copy and move the “Contact Information” sheet to this workbook. This sheet contains references from another sheet of that workbook. I will show you how you can Move or Copy a sheet to another workbook without reference in Excel.
Let’s see the steps.
Steps:
- To begin with, right-click on the sheet name of the sheet you want to move or copy.
- Then, select Move or Copy.
- After that, click on the drop-down option for To book.
- Then, select the workbook where you want to copy or move the Excel sheet.
- Afterward, select where you want to copy or move the worksheet. Here, I selected (move to end).
- Next, check the Create a copy option if you want to copy the worksheet.
- Then, select OK.
- Finally, you will see that you have copied the worksheet and moved it to your desired location in the selected workbook.
- In the following image, you can see that the Excel sheet still contains the references.
- To remove the references, go to the Data tab.
- Then, select Edit Links.
- Here, the Edit Links dialog box will appear.
- Select Break Link.
- After that, a warning message will appear.
- Select Break Links.
- Then, select Close on the Edit Links dialog box.
- In the end, you will see that the references are removed from the sheet.
Read More: Copy Worksheet to Another Workbook without Reference in Excel
Download Practice Workbook
You can download the practice workbook from here.
Conclusion
To conclude, I tried to explain the reasons with solutions why the Move or Copy sheet is not working in Excel. Here, I also explained how to Move or Copy a sheet to another workbook without reference in Excel. I hope this article was helpful to you. If you have any questions, feel free to comment.
This article was helpful. My worksheet copy option was blurred. The article explained I needed to unprotect the workbook. I did that and the problem was solved!
Dear Ryan,
Glad to hear that our article helped you.
Regards
ExcelDemy