How to Remove Hyperlinks in Excel and Keep the Text

How to remove hyperlinks in Excel and keep the text

To remove hyperlinks in Excel and keep the text, select the cells, right-click, and choose Remove Hyperlinks. To clear every link on a sheet at once, press Ctrl + A first. The words stay; the links go.

Before you do it, decide one thing, because "remove the link" means two different jobs. Some people want to keep the friendly text a link displays. Others want to keep the web address behind it. The methods are different, and the wrong one throws away the part you needed.

TL;DR: Key takeaways

Keep the text: right-click, Remove Hyperlinks.
Every link on the sheet: Ctrl + A, then right-click, Remove Hyperlinks.
Links made with =HYPERLINK(): copy, then Paste Values.
Keep the web address instead: convert the link to its URL first.
Stop Excel creating new ones: turn off automatic hyperlinks in AutoCorrect.

Remove the links, keep the text

Microsoft's instruction is direct: "To remove a hyperlink but keep the text, right-click the hyperlink and click Remove Hyperlink."

For a whole column or sheet:

Select the cells with links, or press Ctrl + A to select everything.
Right-click the selection.
Choose Remove Hyperlinks.

The displayed text stays in each cell. What disappears is the clickable address. If a cell still looks blue and underlined afterwards, select it and use Home > Clear > Clear Formats to return it to plain styling.

If you want the cell completely empty, link and text together, select it and press Delete.

Links made with the HYPERLINK function

Remove Hyperlinks does not help when the link comes from a formula such as =HYPERLINK(A2, "Open"). The link is the formula's result, so it comes back as long as the formula is there.

Microsoft's method for these:

Select the cells containing the formula.
Press Ctrl + C.
Right-click and paste using the Values option.

The formula is replaced by its displayed text, and the link goes with it. Converting formulas to values covers doing this across a larger range.

Keep the web address instead

Sometimes the text is the useless part. A column reading "Click here" a hundred times tells you nothing once the links are gone.

In that case, capture the address before removing anything. Our free Convert Hyperlinks to Plain Text macro does it in one pass: for each linked cell in your selection, it reads the address, removes the link, and writes the address into the cell as plain text. Note that it replaces the display text with the URL, which is the point, but it means you should not use it when the friendly text is what you want to keep.

Extracting the URL from a hyperlink covers the other ways to do this, including a formula approach that keeps both.

Stop Excel creating new links

Removing links is pointless if Excel turns every new address you type straight back into one. Switch the feature off:

Go to File > Options > Proofing.
Click AutoCorrect Options, then the AutoFormat As You Type tab.
Clear Internet and network paths with hyperlinks.

This only affects addresses typed from now on. Links already in the workbook stay until you remove them. If you later want the feature back, the same box turns it on again, and our hyperlink troubleshooting guide covers what to check when it seems not to work.

Frequently asked questions

How do I remove all hyperlinks in Excel at once?

Press Ctrl + A to select every cell on the sheet, right-click, and choose Remove Hyperlinks. The text in each cell stays; only the links are removed. Repeat on each sheet that has links, since the selection only covers the active one.

How do I remove a hyperlink but keep the text?

Right-click the cell and choose Remove Hyperlink. This is Microsoft's documented method, and it leaves the displayed text in place. If the cell still appears blue and underlined, use Home > Clear > Clear Formats.

Why won't Remove Hyperlinks work on some cells?

Those links probably come from a HYPERLINK formula. The link is the formula's output, so it reappears. Copy the cells and paste them back as Values, which replaces the formula with plain text.

How do I convert a hyperlink to its URL as plain text?

Use a macro that reads each link's address and writes it into the cell, such as the free Convert Hyperlinks to Plain Text tool. Removing the link the normal way keeps the display text and loses the address.

How do I stop Excel from turning text into hyperlinks?

Go to File > Options > Proofing > AutoCorrect Options, open the AutoFormat As You Type tab, and clear Internet and network paths with hyperlinks. Excel stops converting typed addresses from that point onward.

What to do next

Decide whether you need the text or the address, then pick the method above that keeps it. For the address, run Convert Hyperlinks to Plain Text. To go the other way and make plain URLs clickable, see converting text to clickable hyperlinks.