Technical Bug Report: Critical Memory Leak in Word for Mac

Question

Technical Bug Report: Critical Memory Leak in Word for Mac

Environment Details:

Hardware: MacBook Pro (M4 Chip)

Physical Memory: 16GB RAM / 512GB SSD

Operating System: macOS Tahoe 26.3

Application: Microsoft Word for Mac v16.106.1 (Build 26021521)

Problem Description

Microsoft Word is exhibiting a severe memory leak, with the Microsoft Word process consuming up to 36.42 GB of memory in Activity Monitor. This exceeds physical RAM by over 200%, forcing the system into critical "Red" Memory Pressure and causing system-wide UI lag, application hangs, and thermal throttling.

Observed Symptoms

RAM Consumption: Rapid escalation from ~800MB at launch to >30GB within 30 minutes of usage.

Performance Impact: Significant "typing lag" (500ms+ delay), spinning wait cursors (beachballing), and Microsoft Teams/Outlook performance degradation due to resource contention.

Swap Usage: System reporting high "Swap Used" (20GB+), potentially impacting SSD longevity.

Troubleshooting Steps Taken (Non-Resolutive)

Cleared ~/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Word.

Reset Global Template (Normal.dotm).

Disabled "Connected Experiences" and Microsoft Editor background services.

1. Validated system fonts via Font Book (no corruption found).

Answer 1

To report a bug, please choose Help>Feedback>Report a problem. Include the detail you have posted above. Submitting sends the report to the PowerPoint for Mac team.