Excel cannot open the PivotTable source file

What this looks like

You click Refresh, or reopen a workbook set to refresh on open, and Excel throws “Excel cannot open the PivotTable source file [name]” or a similar dialog naming a file it can't reach. The workbook you have open loads fine — it's specifically the refresh step that fails, and it fails before touching any of the data currently sitting in the pivot.

Why it happens

Not every pivot table is built from data on the same sheet or even the same workbook. Pivots built from an external workbook, a saved query, or a database connection store a path or connection string, not a copy of the live data — the pivot's numbers are a cache from the last time that connection worked. If the source workbook is moved, renamed, deleted, or sits on a network drive or server you're no longer connected to, that cached path goes stale and the refresh has nothing to reach.

What you actually want

The numbers that are already in the workbook, not a live reconnection to a file that may not exist anymore. Every pivot table keeps its last-refreshed results cached inside the workbook itself, independent of the external source. xlsx-for-ai reads that cached pivot data and layout, along with any source data that does live locally in the file, directly — without trying to reopen the external connection — so a dead external link doesn't stop you from getting the data you actually have.