What does "locked for Shared Use" mean, exactly?

Anonymous
2018-01-25T16:34:28+00:00

I've got a file in a SharePoint library that I'm trying to move to a new folder in the same library. But no matter how I try to move it, I get a message that "this file is locked for shared use," by me. But I didn't do anything to lock the file.

How did it get locked, and more importantly, how do I unlock it? Properties, Details, and similar have been unhelpful, and the old turn it off and turn it on again didn't work either.

Microsoft 365 and Office | SharePoint | For business | Windows

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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  1. Anonymous
    2020-01-22T23:09:17+00:00

    I have an excel file in my One Drive that will not delete because it is "locked for shared use" by my own account. I can't figure out how to unlock or delete this 2 year old excel file that I no longer need.

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  2. Anonymous
    2020-01-23T00:23:11+00:00

    How many more people have to report this before Msft actually does something about it? I don't doubt there's some reasonable logic making this happen, but the true test is the end user experience which is obviously not good. I know Msft hates admitting to their mistakes but I don't think there's much choice in this case.

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  3. Anonymous
    2020-01-28T03:54:25+00:00

    It's 2 years now but it still haunts the users. The worst thing is there is no definite work around for this. Being in IT puts you in a bad spot because you do not have a definite solution for the issue.

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  4. Anonymous
    2020-02-21T10:42:51+00:00

    Make sure you're not in your OneDrive, but in SharePoint. You'll see where you are up in the left corner of the browser window.

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  5. Anonymous
    2020-03-09T04:50:43+00:00

    Mine was already set to No and it wasn't working. So I changed it to Yes, saved it. Then changed it back to No and saved it.

    Now it works! Awesome!

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