Use excel to open or save a worksheet in the opendocument spreadsheet ods format

You can open and save files in the OpenDocument Spreadsheet (.ods) file format that is used by some spreadsheet applications, such as OpenOffice.org Calc and Google Docs.

Open an OpenDocument Spreadsheet in Excel

1. Click File > Open > Computer > Browse.

2. To only see files saved in the OpenDocument format, in the file type list (next to the File name box), click OpenDocument Spreadsheet (*.ods).

3. Find the file you want to open, and then click Open.

Note: When you open an OpenDocument Spreadsheet file in Excel, it might not have the same formatting as it did in the original application it was created in. This is because of the differences between applications that use the OpenDocument Format.

Save an Excel worksheet in OpenDocument Spreadsheet format

Important: If you want to keep an Excel version of your file, you need to save the file as an Excel worksheet, for example in the .xlsx file format, and then save it again in the OpenDocument Spreadsheet (.ods) format.

1. Click File > Save As >Computer > Browse.

2. In the Save as type list, click OpenDocument Spreadsheet (*.ods).

3. Name and save your file.

Learn more about the OpenDocument Format

When you open or save worksheets in the OpenDocument Spreadsheet (.ods) format, some formatting might be lost. This is because of the different features and options, such as formatting and tables, that OpenDocument Spreadsheet applications and Excel support. For more information about the differences between the OpenDocument Spreadsheet format and the Excel format, see Differences between the OpenDocument Spreadsheet (.ods) format and the Excel (.xlsx) format.

Tip: Before sending a file to someone else, you might want to close the file and open it again to see what it looks like in the OpenDocument Spreadsheet (.ods) format. To compare the Excel format of the file with the OpenDocument Spreadsheet format of the file, first save the file in the Excel format, then open both the Excel version and the OpenDocument Spreadsheet version and visually inspect the files for differences.