Solution to PowerQuery Create Connection Only being Greyed Out

If you work with PowerQuery (you must if you haven’t started already), you may come across the situation where, after doing all the work in PowerQuery, you are ready to go back to Excel, but you want to load your work as a connection only, not as a table in Excel. So what is a possible cause of the PowerQuery Create connection only being greyed out.

YouTube PowerQuery ‘Create Connection Only’ Greyed Out

Watch, like, subscribe

Did you start with a CSV?

As shown below, we have a simple table which we have sent to PowerQuery, done some work and now want to import the data, but using the ‘Only Create Connection’ option which is grayed out in this case.

PowerQuery Create Connection Only Greyed Out

The reason for this could be your over excitement when working with PowerQuery.

It is such a great tool you may only realise later that you opened the file and it was a .csv file. Excel handles it great, PowerQuery can do its work, but until you save the file as an Excel workbook it can’t use the ‘Only Create Connection option’.

This doesn’t mean you have to restart. Load it as a table, save the file as a Excel Workbook and then go back into the PowerQuery and now you will have the ‘Only Create Connection’ available.

Want to learn more about Microsoft Excel? If you prefer attending a course and live in South Africa look at the Johannesburg MS Excel 3 Day Advanced Course  or the Cape Town MS Excel 3 Day Advanced training course. If you prefer online learning or live outside South Africa, look at our online MS Excel training courses.

Power Query close and load to greyed out

Conditional formatting greyed out in Excel

PowerQuery for Excel