Word is closing approximately every hour, when working on big document.

Question

Word is closing approximately every hour, when working on big document.

Answer 1

Hi!

Welcome to Microsoft Q&A forum.

Word instability with a large document is commonly caused by document corruption or excessive tracked changes and comments.

Check and turn OFF “Track Changes” (if enabled)

1. Go to Review tab
2. Turn OFF Track Changes
3. Accept or reject old changes if possible

Once done, just continue observing and see if there will be improvements.

Can I also confirm if this is happening only with the large document that you're working on? If needed, you can open a new document or small file and check if it's happening there also, if not, Application is fine we need to focus on that big file alone.

Answer 2

Word instability with a large document is commonly caused by document corruption or excessive tracked changes and comments.

To stabilize Word when working on the big document:

1. Close all instances of Word.
2. Start Word and open a new blank document.
3. Go to the Review tab.
4. In the Tracking group, set All Markup.
5. Select Show Markup, then set Balloons to Show only comments and formatting in balloons.
6. Use File > Open and open the problematic large document from within Word (do not double‑click it from File Explorer).
7. Once it opens and is responsive, systematically accept or reject tracked changes and delete comments, especially in heavily edited tables, as table changes have the largest performance impact.

After reducing tracked changes and comments, save the document under a new name and continue working in that cleaned copy. This should reduce or eliminate the periodic closing/crashing when editing the large file.

If Word continues to close even with other documents, run an Online Repair of Office as described in the referenced articles.

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References:

• Word slows or stops responding if there are excessive tracked changes or comments
• How to fix my MS Word? - Microsoft Q&A
• we are sorry, but word has run into an error that is preventing it from working correctly. Word will need to be closed as a result. Would you like us to repair now? - Microsoft Q&A
• How to fix MS Word has run into an error that is preventing from working properly. Word will need to be closed as a result. - Microsoft Q&A