Use long paths with Office 2024 under Windows 11 Pro

Question

I have followed the advice to enable long paths using both the gpedit.msc and the Registry Editor approach. Initially neither approach worked for Office 2024 files (Excel and Word specifically). I then followed the instructions to add a .manifest file from here (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/fileio/maximum-file-path-limitation?tabs=registry#application-manifest-updates-to-declare-long-path-capability) for Excel, which worked (excel.exe.manifest). However, Word already has WINWORD.EXE.manifest file in the Office16 directory so I tried to add the manifest XML to that file. Unfortunately, this did not work.

I would like to be able to use long path names for all the Office 2024 applications and would appreciate any guidance on how to achieve that.

Thanks.

Answer 1

Hi Andy Horsfall,

Since the WINWORD.EXE.manifest file already exists in the Office16 folder, it will need to be modified to include the longPathAware element.

Could you upload the WINWORD.EXE.manifest file to OneDrive and share a public link with me, or paste its contents here? I'd be happy to review it and help you make the necessary changes.

If you have any additional information, please feel free to let me know.

Answer 2

Hi Lucus-V,

thanks for taking the time to respond and offer to help.

Since posting I have attempted to fix my problem, which seems to have worked!

I repaired the installation of Microsoft Office 2024 using the instructions I founds here (Method 1, selecting the via internet option): https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/techtips/how-to-reset-repair-an-app-on-windows-11/.

After reactivating Office by entering my product key, both Word and Excel seemed to handle long paths. Interestingly, the pre-existing WINWORD.EXE.manifest file has now disappeared but the excel.exe.manifest file I had created is still there. Also, a different version of Office seems to have been installed, but it all works after entering my product key.

Rather than delve further I am just happy long path now seems to work and I can get on with what I was doing.

Thanks again for your offer of help Lucas-V. All the best.

Andy