Word Document Lost (Mac)

Question

Hi,

I was working on a document in Microsoft Word on my Mac when the program suddenly crashed. When I reopened Word and tried to open the document again, all of my work was gone.

Could you please help me restore the document? I’m not sure how to recover it and I would really appreciate your assistance.

Thank you very much in advance.

Best regards, [Your Name]

Answer 1

If you had never saved the file, it is probably gone. Save a file as soon as you create it, then AutoRecover has something to recover.

Answer 2

Hi @Sofie Karlson

Thank you for posting question to Microsoft Q&A forum.

You can refer to the Q&A answer to check the Auto Recovery folder by using this path:

/Users/<YourUsername>/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Word/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery

The AutoRecovery folder is a hidden folder, so you probably won't see it if you just try to navigate to it in Finder. Use the Go To Folder tool (or press SHIFT + COMMAND + G) and enter the full path to get around this.

You will see a file with .doc extension.

Additionally, if you Word file is stored on OneDrive, you can use version history to find the old file.

View previous versions of Office files - Microsoft Support

I hope you will be able to find your document.

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Answer 3

To recover a lost Word document on your Mac, you can try the following steps:

1. Check AutoRecover Files: Open Word and go to File > Info > Manage Document > Recover Unsaved Documents. This will show you any unsaved documents that Word has automatically saved.
2. Search for Temporary Files: You can manually search for temporary files on your Mac. Look in the following locations:
   • /Users/<YourUsername>/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Word/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery
   • /Users/<YourUsername>/Documents/Microsoft User Data/Office AutoRecovery Replace <YourUsername> with your actual username.
3. Check the Recycle Bin: Sometimes, documents might end up in the Trash. Open the Trash and see if your document is there.
4. Use Time Machine: If you have Time Machine set up, you can restore a previous version of your document from there.

If none of these methods work, you may need to consider whether the document was saved correctly before the crash.

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References:

• How to recover unsaved Word documents
• Recover files in Office for Mac