Does Microsoft Lists work offline?

Last updated 6 November 2026.

Short answer: partly, on a Windows or Mac computer with the OneDrive sync app. A list that looks up another list does not go offline at all.

Microsoft’s own help article Edit lists offline sets out what works. (Read on 6 November 2026.)

• It needs the OneDrive sync app. The article covers Windows and Mac computers running it. It says nothing about phones or the browser.
• Not everything works. In Microsoft’s words, “a full offline experience for lists” is “not yet supported”. Some actions are greyed out until you reconnect.
• Lists with lookup columns do not sync. The article lists “Lists with Lookup fields” among the lists that stay online only. So do lists in the classic view, and lists whose owner switched sync off.
• Only some lists come with you. Lists you made, or shared lists you have already opened. Anything else shows as unavailable.
• Clashes can land on you. If two people changed the same item, Lists tries to sort it out. If it cannot, you get a red dot and fix the items by hand, or save them to a spreadsheet and fix them there.

What that means at work

• Linked lists stay behind. If your Jobs list looks up a Customers list, the Jobs list is the one that will not open with no signal. Linked lists are how most people moving from Access set things up.
• A phone in the field. Microsoft’s article does not cover the phone app, so do not plan on it.
• A new teammate. A shared list they have not opened yet is not on their laptop when the signal drops.

If your team is online all day, Lists is a good tool, it comes with Microsoft 365, and none of this matters. The gap is when people work where the signal drops and need lists that point at each other.

An app your team uses with no signal

Bionic Forms builds an app from a sentence or a spreadsheet. Our desktop app for Windows, macOS or Linux keeps a full, encrypted copy of the whole database on the computer, links between records included. With no connection your team can add records, search, fix old ones, attach photos and print, for as long as they like. When the computer finds a connection, changes go up and come down by themselves. If two people changed the same record while apart, both versions are kept and a person picks. Nothing is overwritten quietly.

Bringing your list across

Use Export to CSV on the list’s toolbar. Drop the file in the box on our home page and every item comes back as a record, with a field for each column. Free covers unlimited apps and 10,000 entries per app. Business is $29 a month for the whole team, with unlimited users.

Where this is honest

• No phone app yet. If your people only carry phones, AppSheet and Power Apps do more offline on a phone than we do.
• Lists is already paid for. If you have Microsoft 365, Lists costs you nothing extra. We are a separate subscription once you pass the free plan.
• Building an app needs a connection. The AI that builds it runs on our server. Using it afterwards does not.
• We are small and pre-launch. We say plainly which parts are not finished, and your data can always be exported again.