Word Unresponsive

Question

I cannot get word to open but can retrieve the documents by accessing file explorer.

Answer 1

Since you can see your documents but Word won’t open, the Word app itself is likely the issue.

Please try repairing Office: Go to Control Panel > Programs and Features > Microsoft Office / Microsoft 365 > Change. Run Quick Repair first, and if it still doesn’t work, run Online Repair.

If the problem continues, uninstall and reinstall Microsoft Office.

Your documents are safe since you can access them through File Explorer.

Answer 2

If Microsoft Word is unresponsive and you cannot get it to open, you can try the following troubleshooting steps:

1. Repair Word: Exit all Office applications and then run an Online Repair. This often resolves issues where Word fails to open properly. You can find more information on how to perform an Online Repair here.
2. Check for Updates: Make sure that you have the latest updates for Windows and Office installed. Sometimes, issues can arise from outdated software.
3. Start Word in Safe Mode: You can try starting Word in Safe Mode to see if it opens correctly. To do this, hold down the Ctrl key while launching Word, which will open it without add-ins.
4. Rename Normal.dotm: Sometimes, the Normal.dotm template can become corrupted. You can find it in %userprofile%\appdata\roaming\microsoft\templates and rename it to something like Oldword.old. After renaming, try to open Word again.
5. Check Disabled Items: If Word has crashed previously, it may have disabled certain files. You can check for disabled items by going to the Options menu in Word and enabling any disabled files.

If these steps do not resolve the issue, you may need to consider reinstalling Office as a last resort.