How to Compress Excel File Size without Deleting? Best Techniques

Approved By Anuraag Singh

Published On September 4th, 2025

Reading Time 6 Minutes Reading

Category Excel File, How to

Are you also struggling with large Excel files and want to compress them to manage? You are not alone. There are multiple professional who wants to organize their large Excel files easily, but they don’t know the exact way. Don’t worry, this blog has all the answers to your queries. Here we have added the best manual methods and expert solutions to compress Excel file size without opening and deleting anything.

Large Excel files can quickly become a headache, whether you are working with financial data or analyzing and managing data using complex formulas and formatting. And due to this, your Excel’s performance goes down, and also it makes the sharing process with others difficult through email or any cloud platform.

However, you can handle this situation by compressing and reducing the Excel file size without opening or deleting any data. All the methods with proper information are mentioned below. Before starting the method, understand how an Excel file becomes too large.

Why are Users Required to Reduce Excel File Size Without Opening?

Let’s understand why it happens for understanding the basis:

Old Excel Format: Maybe your Excel file is saved in XLS, which is a heavier format than modern formats like XLSX and XLSB.
Empty Rows and Columns: It might be that your file contains unwanted and empty rows and columns, which increases the file size.
Images and Objects: Maybe your file contains high size of images, charts, or shapes.
Excessive Formatting: Sometimes unnecessary formatting’s like bold, colors, borders, and conditional formatting, can increase the size.

These are the basic but major reasons that bring the situation to compress Excel file size. Let’s start the process.

How to Compress Excel File Size without Opening?

Yes, we can decrease the Excel file size by changing the file extension, splitting the file into small parts, removing unused formatting, using compressed images, clearing hidden data, saving data in .zip format, etc.

All methods with working steps are given below one by one. Read them first and then start the process. Let’s start with the expert solution:

#1: Reduce Excel File Size without Deleting Rows/Columns

If you don’t want to delete any data, rows, or columns, then you should download the SysTools Excel Splitter Tool. This software is the perfect and reliable way to compress Excel file size without even deleting any data.

It allows users to split by size, rows, and sheet in bulk without taking too much time, and also without following steps again and again for each file. Download the free version of this amazing tool to reduce Excel file size.

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How to Decrease Excel File Size? Tool’s Step

Step 1: Download the software and choose “Split Excel”.
Step 2: Add your single and multiple files/folders.
Step 3: Select the needed data files and choose the “Next” icon.
Step 4: Choose the “Split Options” and Location to save the file.
Step 5: Now select the “Split” and “OK” button to compress Excel file size.
Step 6: Finally, select the “View Export” icon to access the report.

#2: Save in Modern Formats

If your file is saved in XLS format, then try to save it in the new modern format called XLSX and XLSB.

Open your XLS file.
Choose the “File” tab.
Select the “Save As” option.
Choose the modern format from “File Type”.
Select the location and save it locally.

#3: Delete Rows and Columns

If your file is storing empty rows and columns, then try to delete them to compress Excel file size by following the given steps:

Open your Excel file.
Select the unwanted rows and columns.
Right-click and choose the “Delete” button.
And save the file again.

#4: Compress Images

In case your Excel file has images and media, then compressing them would be a good option to reduce Excel file size without deleting rows and columns.

Select the “Image”.
Choose the “Picture Format”.
And select the “Compress” button.
And your image is successfully compressed.

#5: Clear Hidden Data to Compress Excel Files

Select the whole sheet.
Right-click and choose the “Unhide” option.
And now you can delete unnecessary rows and columns.

#6: Save File as Zip Format

If you don’t have a long time working with your Excel file, and it is taking up too much storage space on the machine, then you can save it in a Zip format:

Locate the Excel file.
Right-click on it.
And now choose the “Compress To” option.
After that, select the “Zip” icon.
Finally, your file is compressed.

Limitations of All Manual Methods

All methods required to open the following steps to compress Excel file size.

You can’t reduce the size of multiple spreadsheets at the same time.

Multiple steps make the process lengthy and time-consuming.

Also, there is no guarantee that these methods will work.

If you go with the deletion method, then there is a high chance of an accidental deletion situation.

Why Should Users Choose Tool Over Manual Methods?

Dual Buttons: This software provides dual options to import single and multiple Excel files and folders, so there is no need to follow the same procedure again and again.
Reduce Excel File Size without Opening: Manual methods require opening the file to compress, while the solution doesn’t need to open large Excel files.
Two-in-One Tool: Also, there is no need to purchase separate solutions, because it’s a two-in-one solution. In simple words, it can split and merge Excel files into a single workbook easily.
Multiple Split Options: It gives you three different split options, like by Row, by Size, and by Sheet, so that you can compress Excel file size selectively.
Select Any Location: After all choices, you can choose any location to save your output data file.
Supports All Type of Excel Files: Excel application saves files in different formats like XLSX, XLS, XLSB, CSV, etc. It supports all file extensions.
Compress Excel File Size in Bulk: Also, this software has the power to compress multiple Excel files at the same time without having any restrictions.

Sum Up

This blog has explained the best ways to compress Excel file size without opening and deleting rows and columns. We have used almost 6 methods, including manual and expert solutions, to decrease the Excel file size. 5 manual methods which is better for one or two files that can be opened.

But if you have large and multiple Excel files and you don’t want to delete any data from rows and columns, then go for the expert solution. It can easily reduce Excel file size without opening and deleting simply and faster than manual methods. You can even download the free version of this solution to understand the steps.