How to open Excel workbooks in new windows (open multiple windows)?

In this tutorial, we will show you how to open Excel workbooks in different windows steps by steps.

• Open Excel workbooks in new windows with holding Shift key and clicking in Taskbar
• Open Excel workbooks in new windows with Start menu
• Open Excel workbooks in new windows with creating shortcut
• Easily open Excel workbooks in new windows with Office Tab

Open Excel workbooks in new windows with holding Shift key and clicking in Taskbar

For the usage of lowest versions of Excel, with holding the Shift key and clicking the Excel icon in the Taskbar, you can open Excel workbooks in multiple windows.

1. Firstly you need to open a workbook in advance, and then hold the Shift key on the keyboard.

2. Click the Excel icon in the Taskbar. See screenshot:

Then a new blank workbook is opened. If you need to edit the new opened workbook, just edit and save it. Otherwise, you can open another workbook you have created before in this new workbook window.

3. Click File (Office button) > Open from your new created workbook just now, In the Open dialog box, find and select the workbook and then click the Open button.

Then you can see the workbooks are opened in two separate Excel windows. You can repeat the above steps to open more Excel windows.

Open Excel workbooks in new windows with Start menu

Besides the above method, you can open Excel workbooks in new windows with Start menu. Please do as follows.

1. Click the Start button to show the menu. Type Excel in the Search box, then click Microsoft Excel in the Programs section. See screenshot:

2. When a new blank workbook opened, please click File (Office button) > Open, In the Open dialog box, find and select the workbook you want to open and then click the Open button.

3. To open multiple workbooks you want, you just need to repeat the above steps one by one.

Open Excel workbooks in new windows with creating shortcut

The last method for opening Excel workbooks in new window is to create a shortcut. Please do as follows.

1. Open the Office folder in your computer with following paths.

In Excel 2010: C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office 14

In Excel 2007: C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12

2. In the opened Office folder, find the EXCEL icon, right click it and then select Create shortcut from the right-clicking menu. See screenshot:

3. Then a Shortcut prompt box pops up, click the Yes button.

4. Then an Excel shortcut is placed on the desktop. Double click it, and a new Excel window will be opened. Then you can click File (Office button) > Open to open the workbook that you need.

5. If you need to open multiple workbooks in new windows, you should repeat step 4 to open them one by one.

Note: For Excel 2013, the workbooks are opened in different windows by default.

Open Excel workbooks in new windows with Office Tab

In this section, I will show you a handy applications – Office Tab. With the Open In New Window feature of Office Tab, open workbooks in new windows is not a problem anymore.

1. After installing Office Tab, open the workbooks you want. Then you will see all workbooks are opened in an Excel window as tabbed browsing status.

2. If you want to open a specific workbook in a new window, please right click this workbook tab, and then click Open In New Window in the list. See screenshot:

Then the selected workbook is opened in a new window as below screenshot shown:

Tip.If you want to have a free trial of this utility, please go to Click for free trial of Office Tab first, and then go to apply the operation according above steps.