How to import tables from Microsoft Excel Online (Office 365)

TablePress can import tables from a variety of popular spreadsheet applications. This includes XLSX files from Microsoft Excel, CSV (Character-Separated Values), ODS (OpenDocument Spreadsheet), HTML, and JSON files. In addition to uploading files from your local computer, it is also possible to import spreadsheets into your WordPress site by providing a URL (link address) to such a file.

This opens up the possibility to import a table from a Microsoft Excel Online (part of Office 365 and SharePoint) table into TablePress. (By the way: The TablePress Max license plan comes with the Automatic Periodic Table Import feature. This allows you to fully automate the table import process, saving you time and effort!)

All that you need for this is a link address to the spreadsheet that directly returns an appropriate file, without any user interface or login screen. This can be done by publicly sharing the Excel Online worksheet and then using a generated (secret) URL for the import into TablePress. Our beginner-friendly step-by-step tutorial will guide you through this process and show you how to find this URL for your Excel Online table.

Step 1: Open your Microsoft Excel Online Worksheet

Go to the Microsoft Office 365 website and sign in to your Microsoft account, if you are not yet logged in. If you are using a corporate version of Excel Online, e.g. via SharePoint, log into that. Create a new spreadsheet or open an existing one that contains the table you want to share.

Step 2: Share the Spreadsheet

Click the “File” menu (1) in the top-left corner of the navigation bar.

Opening the "File" menu in Microsoft Excel Online. — Opening the “File” menu in Microsoft Excel Online.

Choose “Share” (1), and click “Share with People” (2). Alternatively, click on the “Share” button in the top-right corner of the screen, if that’s shown.

Opening the "Share with People" dialog in Microsoft Excel Online. — Opening the “Share with People” dialog in Microsoft Excel Online.

In the “Share” dialog, click the “Anyone with the link can edit” text (1) in the lower “Copy link” section.

The "Share" dialog in Microsoft Excel Online. — The “Share” dialog in Microsoft Excel Online.

In the “Sharing settings”, click “Can edit” (1) right below “More settings” and choose the “Can view / Can’t make changes” option (2). Then, click the “Apply” button (3).

Changing the "Sharing settings" in Microsoft Excel Online. — Changing the “Sharing settings” in Microsoft Excel Online.

After configuring the sharing settings, click the “Copy” button (1) on the right side of the dialog. You will now have the shortened Sharing link for the Microsoft Excel Online user interface in your computer’s clipboard.

Copying the "View" link in Microsoft Excel Online. — Copying the “View” link.

If you are using Excel Online via a corporate Microsoft SharePoint instance, you will already have an expanded URL and can skip to the end of the following step.

Step 3: Obtaining the Sharing URL

This shortened Sharing link needs to be converted into the proper URL for downloading the table as a file, unless you are using Excel Online as part of Microsoft SharePoint. In that case, just skip to the end of this step.

For the next steps, open a new “private” or “incognito” browser window

via your browser’s menu,
the keyboard shortcut cmd/ctrl + Shift + N (in Chrome), or
the keyboard shortcut cmd/ctrl + Shift + P (in Firefox),

or use a different browser. This is important as you must be logged out of your Microsoft account for these steps to work!

Paste the copied link into the address bar of that “private” or “incognito” browser window.

The shortened Sharing link "https://1drv.ms/x/s!{id}?e={authkey}" of a Microsoft Excel Online worksheet pasted into the browser's address bar.

The link looks like

https://1drv.ms/x/s!{id}?e={authkey}Code language: HTML, XML (xml)

where {id} and {authkey} are long sequences of letters and numbers that internally identify your worksheet.

Press “Enter” to load that URL. Your table will again open in the Microsoft Excel Online user interface, in read-only mode, and the URL in the address bar will change to a URL that looks like

https://onedrive.live.com/view.aspx?resid={id}&authkey=!{authkey}Code language: HTML, XML (xml)

In that URL, replace the text view.aspx after the onedrive.live.com domain

The View link "https://onedrive.live.com/view.aspx?resid={id}&authkey=!{authkey}" of a Microsoft Excel Online worksheet pasted into the browser's address bar.

with the text download

The Download link "https://onedrive.live.com/download?resid={id}&authkey=!{authkey}" of a Microsoft Excel Online worksheet pasted into the browser's address bar.

Copy that modified URL, which now looks like this:

https://onedrive.live.com/download?resid={id}&authkey=!{authkey}Code language: HTML, XML (xml)

That’s it! You now have a link address that can be used for importing the Microsoft Excel Online table into TablePress.

If you are using Excel Online as part of a corporate Microsoft SharePoint instance, you will have a URL in the scheme

https://{company-id}.sharepoint.com/:x:/{some-long-id}?e={key}Code language: HTML, XML (xml)

from Step 2. In that case, the change is slightly different: Simply append &download=1 to the end of this URL.

A quick tip: To check if a URL link is suitable, try opening it in a “private”/”incognito” browsing window again. If you are offered an xlsx file for download, without seeing a spreadsheet user interface or having to log in first, the URL should work for the import into TablePress.

Step 4: Import the URL into TablePress

Once you have the correct Sharing URL from Step 3, you can use that for importing the Microsoft Excel Online worksheet into TablePress. For that, go to the “Edit” screen of TablePress on your WordPress site. Choose “URL” as the “Import Source” and paste the URL into the “File URL” text field. After clicking the “Import” button, your Excel Online table will be imported into TablePress. You can then edit it as needed and show it on your site by embedding the “TablePress table” block (if you are using the block editor) or the corresponding Shortcode into a post or page.

Importing a TablePress table from the generated Sharing URL of a Microsoft Excel Online worksheet.

Note that (just like any other file import in TablePress) this is a one-time import. There is no automatic synchronization with changes in your Excel Online worksheet! However, there is a great solution for that as well: The TablePress Max license plan comes with the Automatic Periodic Table Import feature. This module can periodically import your tables periodically (e.g. every minute, every hour, etc.). Not only does this help you save a lot of time by not having to repeat the import task manually, but it also allows other people to update tables on your website, e.g. by using a shared Excel Online worksheet for data editing.

By the way: This process also works with files uploaded to Microsoft OneDrive! To open the Sharing dialog, just right-click on the file in OneDrive and find the “Share” entry. Then, follow the steps above.

Tutorials on how to create such a URL for other services like Google Sheets, Google Drive, or Dropbox are available on the Tutorials, Guides, and How-tos page.