Forms: Opening in Excel

Question

Hello,

For some reason the two newest forms I've created will only open in Excel as a downloadable file – it will not allow me to open the results of the Form in the browser version of Excel.

I checked the settings and they look to appear the same, the only differences between the forms is the Excel logo and an additional icon on top of the Themes dropdown (screenshots below).

Does anyone know what would trigger this and how to reverse it?

Thank you

Edit: I just notice an additional difference between the screenshots – the option to show results automatically (it is almost as if I am running two different versions of Forms...)

Answer 1

Hi Josh,

The forms created through the Form widget on SharePoint is similar to the forms created through OneDrive for business, because OneDrive for business is a highly customized SharePoint Online site, in other words, they are almost the same thing, therefore you will get the exported workbook opened in Excel Web App rather than downloading it.

 

The difference is that in this case, the workbook is NOT automatically stored in OneDrive, instead, it will be automatically stored in the current site's document library.

Best Regards,

Arck

Answer 2

Hi Josh,

Thanks for using Microsoft products and posting in the community, I'm glad to offer help.

According to the official article: Check and share your form results – PowerPoint, we can see that if the forms were are created in Microsoft Forms directly, clicking 'Open in Excel' will download an offline workbook instead of opening the workbook in Excel Web App.

 

Hope the above information can be helpful, and please feel free to let me know if you have any concerns, I'll continue to help you.

Best Regards,

Arck

Answer 3

Hello Arck,

Thank you for your response – this worked.

What a bizarre system – if I create my Forms through the Form widget on Sharepoint I do not run into this problem, but if I create them through Forms directly I do (and does not appear to be an obvious way to rectify this without recreating the form from scratch).

Is this the case? What is the functionality of this distinction?

Thank you again,

Josh

Answer 4

Understood – thank you for taking the time to respond, Arck!

All the best,

Josh

Answer 5

Hi Josh,

Glad to be able to help you.

And you are welcome to post in this community again if you have any questions about Microsoft in the future, we are always willing to try our best to help you.

Stay safe and have a nice day : )

Best Regards,

Arck