What Is Protected View? Turn on and Off the Protected View

This updated guide examines What Is Protected View? Turn on and Off the Protected View and organizes the essential facts, background, and practical takeaways in clear American English.

Why use Protected View?

Protected View protects you from viruses, malware, and threats that can be encountered when opening Excel files from unknown sources.

This mode is also quite suitable for spreadsheets and documents that you just want to open for reading without editing.

How to switch to the editing mode of the Protected View file

Protected View mode is enabled by default . Therefore, whenever you open a file that is not originally from a website or received via email, you will automatically open the file in Protected View mode.

When you open the file in this format, a warning line will appear along the top of the open document and the Enable Editing button , click on it, the program will allow you to edit the document after you have finished considering.

One type to edit is the document that is opened as read-only with some content not shown.

If in this format, you should save the document as another copy for easier work.

How to disable the Protected View mode

Although this feature is quite useful, it also causes many difficulties for users because it cannot edit content in documents and documents immediately. If you want to turn off the Protected View feature in Office 2016 , you can refer to the following way.

Note:

• The following tutorial, for example with Excel 2016, does the same thing with Word and Power Point to turn off the Protected View feature.
• You should consult your IT or network administrator if you do this on a common system, as it will most likely bring potential risks.

To turn off Protected View , follow these steps:

Step 1: Click File located on the top left from the taskbar.

Step 2: In the new interface, from the left menu, click on the Options item .

Step 3: In the Excel Options interface, also on the left menu, click Trust Center .

Step 4: Next, choose Trust Center Settings.

Step 5: Switch to the Trust Center interface, click the Protected View category.

Step 6: There are 3 modes here: files originating from the Internet, unsafe locations and Outlook attachments . Disable all 3 by unchecking each option if you don't want Protected View to interfere with your file in the future.

Thus, we have disabled the Protected View feature in Office 2016. When you reopen the document, the Enable Editing button will not appear again, so you can edit it directly. In particular, the documents we downloaded from the Internet also have the Protected View protection removed.

It is possible to evaluate Protected View as a very useful feature that helps protect users from potential threats when opening documents from unknown sources. This mode is very common when working with Office on mobile devices or accessing files in frequently used public places.