Dark mode on Word in webbrowser (Mac OS)

Dear Heiko,

Thanks for posting back.

Sorry for providing the wrong conclusion in my first reply. I have checked all settings again and found the related setting that will cause this situation on your side. To turn off the dark mode in Word for Web, please open any Word documents in the browser, click the View tab, click Dark Mode to turn off it. The dark mode button I want to double confirm in my first reply is available in Office Portal (go to https://www.office.com/launch/word, don't open any documents, click the Settings button).

@Jim

You are right, there are indeed relevant settings in Word for Web to turn on/off the dark mode. At first, I haven't found this setting, no official documentation mentions this feature, and some old threads and suggestions in Microsoft Feedback Portal also mention the Dark Mode is not available in Word for Web. These made me think that this feature doesn't exist in Word for the Web unless you have some 3rd party extension installed in your browser, and think the situation may related to the Dark Mode in Office Portal. Again, thanks for pointing out my mistake.

Appreciate your understanding and patience.

Sincerely,

George | Microsoft Community Moderator

That setting doesn't exist on my settings page.

Thanks Derek, this is the reason why Word defaults to Dark Mode when I use Safari. If I go into System Preferences - General and switch Appearance back to Auto it fixes it.

However, I'm now wedded to Dark Mode for Safari and can't bring myself to go back to Light Mode. Hopefully they'll fix this soon as It's very annoying having to change back to Light Mode every time I open a Word document online.

I'm not sure how different Mac OS is versus Windows, but it turns out it was an OS setting of mine on Windows that was causing the problem.

Under my Personalization Settings -> Color, I have my computer to use Dark for the colors option. However, this (maybe recently?) applies to both the "default Windows mode" and the "default apps mode". I instead chose the option to use Custom for the colors option, which allowed me to keep the Windows mode as Dark but the apps mode as Light, which fixed the way Word Online documents were opening default as Dark Mode.

I am thinking it is something that must have come through in a update recently because I did not have this problem come up until a few weeks ago (on my work computer).

Hope this helps.

-Derek

@ George

Which settings? Where? What settings should be changed from what to what?