Excel 2016 using excessive CPU capacity

Question

Hi.  I have one workbook open with 7 tabs.  Total workbook size is 1.24mb.  Nothing more than 60 rows of data.  Several pivot tables used.

 I'm running Excel 2016 via an Office 365 license our work has.  My o/s is Windows 10 Pro.  My processor is Intel Core i7-4770 @ 3.4GHZ.  32GB RAM.  64 bit. 

I am losing Excel functionality, i.e. the tool bar goes blank rendering Excel useless, high mouse latency, etc.  Task Manager shows Excel is consuming 30% of my CPU capacity.  I reinstalled Office 365 earlier today to try to address this ongoing problem but that does not appear to have succeeded.  I'm at a loss to understand how such a small workbook is consuming so much capacity. 

What are best guesses for what is going on?

Many thanks.

Answer 1

Hi Jon,

About the issue that Excel is consuming 30% of the CPU capacity, I would like to explain that Excel performance is related to the exact content in the Excel file. Therefore, please try open a new simple Excel file to check the result. If the issue persists, please follow the steps below to improve this situation:

1. Speed up by using all processors for calculating
2. Close other programs
3. Switch Excel to manual calculation
4. Disable all Excel add-ins
5. Same cell ranges in formulas
6. Replace formulas with values
7. Avoid conditional formatting
8. Avoid data tables
9. Move data into one sheet.

More details can be found in the article: http://professor-excel.com/15-ways-to-speed-up-excel/

Disclaimer: Microsoft provides no assurances and/or warranties, implied or otherwise, and is not responsible for the information you receive from the third-party linked sites or any support related to technology.

Regards,

Shirley

Answer 2

Hi SafetyMichael,

About the issue, may I know if you tried the suggestions above? If not, could you try it?

If the issue persists, because similar issues may have different root causes, it is best to post a new thread with detailed information about the issue you encountered and which Office 365 subscriptions you use. Then, we can focus on the details of your exact scenario to provide technical support.

Thanks for your understanding.

Shirley

Answer 3

I have the same situation. I have had my computer and Office 365 for 1.5 years. Excel or an office program has never experienced high CPU usage, and has never locked up until the most recent windows update in November. This just started happening within the month of November, after an office update. Excel locks up and changes since the last save are lost. They are not even reflected in the recovery file.

Answer 4

Hi Jon,

Have you referred to the information above? Do you need further assistance?

Regards,

Shirley

Answer 5

Excessive file size is not the only reason for poor performance in a spreadsheet.  Poor design, "misuse" of features, using features that normally perform reasonably, but in certain circumstances lead to poor performance.

What you need to do is "optimize" the workbook.  Look through it and find the performance "bottlenecks" and rewrite the code to be more efficient.

Take a look a this similar question where I've posted a bunch of links about optimizing spreadsheets:

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice/forum/msoffice\_excel-mso\_win10/excel-optimization/3a5b97b9-0ed1-45ec-b7b3-263903858a87