In excel, when I click the help (?) icon, I get "Sorry, something went wrong. Please check your network connection and try again." My network connection is fine. How do I correct this error?

I've seen this answer on a number of complaint posts. This will not fix anything as far as I know. The Internet connection is fine. I am fully logged on using my MS Account. This is some connection issue specific to Excel (although it may occur in other Office apps but I've not seen it). Frankly, this is inexcusable. There are many complaints over this same issue and if it's not your answer which is useless information, then there are other fixes which work for some people some times. For instance, the logging out and logging in will get Excel help back but only until the connection to Help is dropped, usually a short time later. Or, how about the reboot? Cold or hot reboot? Doesn't make a difference. Closing out of all Office apps? Works for a while, then the Excel help connection is dropped. Microsoft, forget about AI and fix what you already have.

I've seen this answer on a number of complaint posts. This will not fix anything as far as I know. The Internet connection is fine. I am fully logged on using my MS Account. This is some connection issue specific to Excel (although it may occur in other Office apps but I've not seen it). Frankly, this is inexcusable. There are many complaints over this same issue and if it's not your answer which is useless information, then there are other fixes which work for some people some times. For instance, the logging out and logging in will get Excel help back but only until the connection to Help is dropped, usually a short time later. Or, how about the reboot? Cold or hot reboot? Doesn't make a difference. Closing out of all Office apps? Works for a while, then the Excel help connection is dropped. Microsoft, forget about AI and fix what you already have.

You are absolutely right. This problem has been around for many months. I see it happening on various Office 365 apps such as Excel, Word, and Outlook. See my original post and my numerous updates over time.

I do hope it gets fixed sometime soon. Luckily, it's not a showstopper issue and it has a work around; close out the failing app and restart it, it will work again for a while before failing again.

LOTS of people have this problem, including me. Former Microsoft employee and know what I am doing. The help functionality simply doesn't work no matter what suggestions are implemented. This is obviously a bug, and an important one. I'm taking a class that uses a lot of lesser-known Excel functions. The availability of Help is essential!!

My last post on this issue was a month ago. The problem still persists. I keep hoping that someday it will work again reliability. I'm still waiting.

I did a variant of the original answer which seems to work so far.

i.e.: after doing this:

* Open the Excel app> go to File > options> select trust center> select trust center settings> Click on Privacy Option> Click on privacy settings > Check all the connected experiences including "Turn On experiences that download online content" and "Turn on experiences that analyze content" *

Close and reopen Excel

which didn't work, I then unchecked:

Optional diagnostic data

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Close and reopen Excel

and help was working again!