Connect Azure Boards to an Office client

TFS 2018

To support your work tracking efforts, use Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Project. You can either work in online mode, where you're connected to Azure DevOps. Or, work in offline mode, where you access the local computer and document.

Tip

For bulk import or to update work items, use the web portal or CSV import.

Supported Office clients and Azure DevOps versions

The following table indicates the Office clients supported for each Azure DevOps version. MacOS isn't supported. Even if you installed Visual Studio for Mac, connection to Azure DevOps from Excel or any other Office client isn't supported.

---

Azure DevOps/Visual Studio version

Excel

Project¹

PowerPoint Storyboarding²

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Azure DevOps Services
Azure DevOps Server 2020
Azure DevOps Server 2019 Visual Studio 2022
Visual Studio 2019
Azure DevOps Office Integration 2019

✔️

TFS 2018
Visual Studio 2017

✔️

✔️

✔️

Note

1. Support for Project integration and the TFSFieldMapping command is deprecated for Azure DevOps Server 2019 and later versions. You might find support using one of the Marketplace extensions.
2. Support for linking PowerPoint files to work items from within PowerPoint is deprecated starting with Visual Studio 2019 and Azure DevOps Office Integration 2019. You can still link to PowerPoint using the Storyboard link from within a work item. Also, the Visual Studio Gallery for PowerPoint Storyboarding is deprecated.

Prerequisites

Connection from an Office client to an Azure Boards project requires the following software and permissions.

• To connect Excel to Azure Boards, you must install Office Excel 2010 or later version, including Microsoft 365.

• To connect Project to Azure Boards, you must install Office Project 2010 or later version, including Microsoft 365.

• To connect PowerPoint to Azure Boards, you must install Office PowerPoint 2010 or later version installed.

• Installed Visual Studio 2013 or later version or Team Foundation Server Standalone Office Integration (free)

• The only way to get the Team Foundation plug-in is by installing one of the latest editions of Visual Studio or the TFS Standalone Office Integration plug-in. The plug-in supports connection to TFS from Excel, Project, and the PowerPoint-based storyboarding tool.

• To connect to an Azure Boards project, you need to be a member of the project. If you don't have an Azure Boards project yet, you can create one.

• Office Excel 2010 or later version, including Microsoft Office Excel 365

• Office Project 2010 or later version, including Office Project 365

• Visual Studio 2013 or later version or Team Foundation Server Standalone Office Integration (free)

• Permissions to connect to the project.

For information about compatibility requirements, see Compatibility with Azure DevOps.

Important

You might receive the following error if you install Microsoft Office 2010 on the same computer as a previous version of Office.

Team Foundation Error, Interface not registered (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80040155)

You might resolve this error by repairing Office. Access the Repair option by opening the Control Panel, choose Uninstall or change a program, open the context menu for Office 2010, and then choose Change. For more information, see Azure DevOps-Office integration issues.

Publish and refresh work items

When you add or update work items from Excel, local copies of your work items are created. To keep data in sync, it's important to refresh your local file when you open it and publish and refresh frequently during a long online session.

At first, the data in the local document matches the data in the database. But you or other team members can change the data about work items and cause the two to differ. To view the most recent changes from the database, refresh the document. The refresh downloads the latest values in the data store to your local document. To write changes from the document to the database, publish the changes. Publishing uploads the changes you made to the work item tracking data store.

To keep work items in sync from your local data store and Azure Boards, publish and refresh often.

Azure DevOps and Excel

To work in Excel, see Bulk add work items with Excel.

Connect an Azure DevOps project to Excel

To add or modify work items by using Excel, connect your worksheet to a project. Establish this connection to bind the document to the Azure DevOps project to exchange information.

Note

• While this section illustrates how to connect Excel to an Azure Boards project, the steps to connect to PowerPoint are similar.
• When you connect to Azure Boards in the cloud, the Team Project Collection automatically gets selected, as there's only one collection associated with your Azure DevOps Services organization. When you connect to Azure Boards in an on-premises server, choose the Team Project Collection prior to choosing the project.

You can start work from the web portal, Excel, or Visual Studio/Team Explorer. Your worksheet is associated with either a list of work items or a work item query.

Open query in Excel (web portal)

This connection method requires that you install Azure DevOps Open in Excel. It also requires Visual Studio 2017 or later version.

1. From your web browser, (1) check that you selected the right project, (2) choose Boards > Queries, and then (3) choose All.

   

2. Choose the query you want to open in Excel.

3. From the Results tab, choose the actions icon.

   

Connect from client to Azure Boards

To connect from your Office client to an Azure DevOps Services project, do the following steps.

1. Start with a blank worksheet.

2. If your client is signed into a user account, make sure that it's your Azure DevOps user account. If not, choose your account name and sign in as another user.

   

3. If you don't see the Team ribbon (or the Team menu if you use Office 2007), see Azure DevOps Office integration issues.

4. Select Team, place your cursor in Cell A1, and then select New List.

   

5. The Connect to Azure DevOps Server dialog opens.

   

   If you're signed into your Office client with your Azure DevOps user account, the set of servers, both cloud and on-premises that you have access to, automatically populate in the drop-down menu.

   If you're not signed-in, you're working from an older version of an Office client, or you aren't connected to any servers, add them now.

6. Add a server to connect to.

   (1) Choose Servers..., (2) choose Add..., (3) enter the URL of your Azure Boards organization, and (4) check that the preview matches the URL that you entered. Then choose OK.

   

   If you can't connect, get added as a team member.

7. With the server selected, choose the project you want to connect to, and then choose Connect.

   

   Make sure your Azure DevOps user account appears at the bottom of the dialog. If it isn't, choose Switch User and sign in to the correct account.

8. From the New List dialog, choose Input list. Or, if you want to work with a list of work items defined in a query, choose Query list.

   

Connect client to Azure DevOps on-premises

To connect from your Office client to an Azure DevOps Server project, do the following steps.

1. Start with a blank worksheet.

2. If your client is signed into a user account, make sure that it's yours. If not, choose your account name and sign in as another user.

   

3. If you don't see the Team ribbon (or the Team menu if you use Office 2007), see Azure DevOps-Office integration issues.

4. Choose the Team tab, place your cursor in Cell A1, and then choose New List.

   

   The Connect to Azure DevOps Server dialog opens.

   

   If you're signed into your Office client with your Azure DevOps user account, the set of servers that you have access to, both cloud and on-premises, automatically populate in the drop-down menu.

   If you're not signed-in, you're working from an older version of an Office client, or you aren't connected to any servers, add them now.

5. Add a server to connect to.

   (1) Select Servers..., (2) choose Add..., (3) enter the name of your Azure DevOps Server instance. As needed, change the Port number if your deployment uses a nondefault port number. The Preview entry should display the correct URL for your deployment. (4) Choose OK.

   

   Choose Close to close the Add/Remove servers dialog. From the Select an Azure DevOps Server dialog, make sure the server you added is selected, and then choose Connect.

   If you can't connect, get added as a team member.

6. With the server selected, choose the project you want to connect to, and then choose Connect.

   

   Make sure your Azure DevOps user account appears at the bottom of the dialog. If it isn't, choose Switch User and sign in to the correct account.

7. From the New List dialog, choose Input list. Or, if you want to work with a list of work items defined in a query, choose Query list.

   

Open Excel from Visual Studio

1. Open Visual Studio and then Team Explorer.

   Important

   To work from Visual Studio/Team Explorer, select Tools > Options > Work Items > General > Legacy experience. For more information, see Set the Work Items experience in Visual Studio.

   

2. Connect to your Azure DevOps project that contains the work items you want to add to or update. For more information, see Connect to a project.

3. Right-click the query you want to open and choose.

   

   Excel opens with the work items listed in the query that you selected.

For more information, see Bulk add work items with Excel.

Tip

You can use multiple worksheets within an Excel workbook to work with different input or query lists. But, you can only connect to one project per workbook.

If you move your Azure DevOps project to a different project collection in the same instance of Azure DevOps, your documents automatically reconnect. But, if the project moves to a different instance of Azure DevOps, you must manually reconnect your documents to the new server.

Work offline and reconnect to Azure Boards

One advantage of working in Excel is that you can work offline and add or modify work items. The following procedures show you how to disconnect an Excel work item list from Azure Boards. You can then reconnect later to synchronize the document with the work item database.

Note

If the project that contains work items for your Excel document is moved to a different organization or Azure DevOps Server instance, you must reconfigure the server to which the document connects. For more information, see Connect Azure DevOps project to Excel provided earlier in this article.

Disconnect a document file from the network

To disconnect an Excel document file from the network:

1. Open the document that you want to change while you're offline.

2. Refresh the work item list to retrieve the latest information from the work item database. In Excel, on the Team ribbon, in the Work Items group, choose Refresh.

3. Add to the work item list the columns for all fields that you want to modify. You can't add columns when the work item list is disconnected from the server.

4. Disconnect your computer from the network, or save the work item list file and copy it to another computer.

   An error message might appear that tells you the Office program couldn't establish a connection with an Azure DevOps Server.

5. Modify or update the work item list as needed.

   You can't create most types of links between work items when the work item document is disconnected from the system. The exceptions are parent-child links in an Excel tree list.

Reconnect a file to Azure Boards

To reconnect an Excel document file:

1. Reconnect your computer to the network, or copy the file to a computer that is connected to Azure Boards.

2. If you changed the document offline, in Excel, on the Team ribbon, in the Work Items group, choose Publish.

3. If you didn't change the document offline, in Excel, on the Team ribbon, in the Work Items group, choose Refresh.

4. Resolve any data validation errors or conflicts that occur.

Marketplace extensions

The following Marketplace extensions support integration between Azure DevOps and Office products.

• Azure DevOps Open in Excel: Opens a selected query in Excel.
• Office 365 Integration: Pushes notifications of configurable Azure DevOps events to an Office 365 Group.

Related articles

• Bulk modify work items (web portal)
• Bulk import or update work items using CSV files
• FAQs: Work in Excel connected to Azure Boards
• Create your backlog