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Office Scripts file storage and ownership

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The details of how scripts are stored and shared depend on your Microsoft 365 subscription. Select the relevant tab to learn more.

Important

Office Scripts is in preview for personal and family Microsoft 365 subscriptions. If you encounter any issues, please report them through the Feedback button in Excel.

File storage

Office Scripts are stored in your OneDrive by default. The .osts files are found in the /Documents/Office Scripts/ folder. Any edits made to these .osts files, such as renaming or deleting files, will be reflected in the Code Editor and Script Gallery. Excel only recognizes and runs a script if it's in your OneDrive folder, a Sharepoint folder, or shared with the workbook. This means Excel needs internet connectivity to access Office Scripts.

OneDrive

Scripts that are shared with one of your workbooks remain in the script creator's OneDrive. They are not copied to any of your local or OneDrive folders when you run the shared script in Excel. The Move button shown when renaming a script moves the script to a new location. The Make a Copy button of the Code Editor saves a separate copy of the script in your OneDrive. Changes to the copy don't affect the original script.

Unless you share your personal scripts, no one else can access them. Your OneDrive settings control the shared access and permissions for all script .osts files, independent of any Excel settings. Scripts can't be linked from a local disk or custom cloud locations.

SharePoint

Office Scripts that are saved to a SharePoint site are owned by your team. You and members of your organization with the appropriate access can run and edit scripts from SharePoint. You'll also see these scripts appear in the Automate tab's Script Gallery.

To load a script from SharePoint, go to All scripts and select View more scripts at the bottom of the list. This brings up a file picker where you can choose .osts files from any SharePoint site to which you have access. Note that scripts from SharePoint that you've already opened will be displayed in the list of recent scripts.

To move a script to SharePoint, open a script in the Code Editor and click on the script name, as if you're renaming it. In the callout, click the Move button. This opens a file picker. Select the destination folder in your SharePoint site. Moving the script to the new location can take up to a minute.

To save a copy of a script to SharePoint, go to the More options (…) menu and select Save as. This opens a file picker where you can select folders in your SharePoint site. Saving to a new location creates a copy of the script at that location. The original version is still on your OneDrive or other SharePoint location.

Important

Scripts with external calls can't be run from SharePoint. You'll receive an error saying "Network access calls are not supported at this time for scripts saved to a SharePoint site".

Note

Power Automate supports running scripts stored on SharePoint with the Run script from SharePoint library (Preview) action. This action is currently in preview and is subject to change based on feedback. If you encounter any issues with this action, please report them through the Help > Give Feedback option in Power Automate.

Share scripts

To give users who are outside of the SharePoint site access to the script, share the script with an Excel workbook. This means you're linking the script with the file, not attaching it. Whoever has access to the Excel file will also be able to view, run, or make a copy of the script.

Note

Admin settings for Conditional Access in OneDrive and SharePoint affect Office Scripts. For more information, see the Conditional Access section of Platform limits and requirements with Office Scripts.

Restore deleted scripts

When you delete a script in Excel, it goes to your OneDrive or SharePoint recycle bin. To restore a deleted script, follow the steps listed in How to recover missing, deleted or corrupted items in SharePoint and OneDrive for work or school. Restoring an .osts file returns it to the All scripts list.

A deleted script is unshared with the workbook. When you restore a script, it does not retain its script access. You will need to share the script again.

Restored scripts still work as expected with Power Automate flows. You don't need to recreate the flow connector.

File ownership and retention

Office Scripts follow the retention and deletion policies specified by Microsoft OneDrive and Microsoft SharePoint. To learn how to handle scripts that were created and shared by a user being removed from your organization, see Learn about retention for SharePoint and OneDrive.

During editing, files are temporarily stored in the browser. You must save the script before closing the Excel window to save it to the OneDrive location. Don't forget to save the file after edits, or else those edits will only be in the browser's version of the file.

Audit Office Scripts usage at the admin level

Discover who is using Office Scripts in your organization with the compliance center audit log. Details about the audit log are found in Search the audit log in the Security & Compliance Center.

To specifically audit Office Scripts related activity as an admin, take the following steps.

  1. In a InPrivate browser window (or Incognito or other browser-specific limited-tracking mode), open and log into the Compliance center.

  2. Go to the Audit page.

  3. (One time only) On the Search tab, select Start recording user and admin activity.

    Important

    It may take an hour or two after turning on recording before all activities across the tenant are recorded.

  4. Set the desired search options and select Search. Filter the File, folder, or site field to .osts. This reveals who in your organization is creating or modifying scripts.

    A few rows of audit log search results, including the 'Ran script on workbook' action and the upload and modification of an .osts file.

See also