Fix error: Excel cannot complete this task with available resources
Summary: While Microsoft Excel is widely used across the world, errors are common in the application. This especially happens if your workbook has a lot of complex formulas and macros, and is filled with tons of data. Resolving Excel errors is usually an easy task, but before fixing an error, it is essential to identify its root cause. Through this post, let us try to troubleshoot "available resources" errors in Excel.
While working with Microsoft Excel, a lot of users report that they get “Excel cannot complete this task with available resources” error. While this is a common error, it is not easy to identify the actual cause behind it. This error may occur if your Excel spreadsheet has lots of macros, data, and formulas in it. Therefore, it is possible that your computer doesn’t have enough resources to process the spreadsheet, and hence, throws this error.
Why this error occurs?
The error typically occurs while performing the following actions with Microsoft Excel:
- Try to open a new Excel file or save an existing Excel file
- Try to use a particular defined name in a formula while using Excel sheet
- Open an Excel file which is referencing a relative name from another excel file
- Try to delete or define a name in the excel file
- If you have opened more than 1 active instance of Excel on your computer or laptop
- If your RAM is too low for processing the Excel spreadsheet easily
When this error occurs?
This error occurs when an Excel file has a very large spreadsheet in it. Suppose your spreadsheet has more than 10,000 rows in it, then you might get this error.
It can also occur once your total number of characters in a cell exceeds 32,767. You can’t go above that limit or else you will receive this error. You will also get this error if the nested loop of functions used in a calculation exceeds 64. The maximum defined limit is 64.
Now that we have enough background knowledge about them, let us proceed to troubleshoot “available resources” errors in Excel.
How to resolve this error manually?
Follow these methods in the given order to resolve the Excel error, before proceeding to the next method.
Method 1: Check if you are exceeding defined limits in Excel file
There are certain limits for Microsoft Excel while dealing with a large number of calculations and functions. You need to work within the defined limits while using the Excel spreadsheet so that the functions and calculations can be executed smoothly.
The limits are defined in the previous section. For more details, you can check the full list of limitations and specifications at this reference.
If you have checked that the Excel workbook is within limits but are still getting the error, move to the next method.
Method 2: Open only one instance of Microsoft Excel at a time
You need to check if there are multiple Excel instances running on your system. This error can come if more than one Excel workbook is opened at a time. Therefore, the best way is to close all the running instances of Microsoft Excel by using Task Manager, and then reopen the workbook and check.
- Go to Task Manager by using Alt + CTRL + DELETE keys.