Saving a Workbook as a Template

If you use the same workbook frequently, such as for entering the time you spent on projects during a week or tracking travel expenses, you will find that using a template saves you and your colleagues a lot of work. Saving a workbook is a straightforward process; all you need to do is create a workbook that contains the number of worksheets, formulas, and formatting you want and then save the workbook in the appropriate format.

Save a Workbook as a Template

Click the Microsoft Office button.

Click Save As.

Click the Save As Type down arrow.

Click Excel Template.

Type the name you want for the template.

Click Save.

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Caution

Be sure you don’t change the directory where Excel offers to save your template. If you do change it, your template won’t show up in the list of available templates. You could still open it by navigating to the folder in which you saved it, of course.

Tip

You should remove any existing data from a workbook you save as a template, both to avoid data entry errors and to remove any confusion as to whether the workbook is a template. The one exception to this rule is when your template contains formulas that would result in an error if you delete all data from the worksheet. In that case, you should enter some obviously incorrect data that future users know to replace.