My word documents aren't working

Question

All of sudden I cannot edit my word documents or create new ones.

Answer 1

All of sudden I cannot edit my word documents or create new ones.

Which operating system are you running and which version of Office?

Do you see any error messages that refer to activation?

Answer 2

Try these steps in order:

1. Update Office
   • Open Word and create a blank document if possible.
   • Go to File > Account.
   • Under Product Information, select Update Options > Update Now.
   • If Update Now is not shown, select Enable Updates first.
2. Start Word in Safe Mode to check add-ins
   • Open Run.
   • Type winword /safe and press Enter.
   • Confirm the title bar shows Microsoft Word (Safe Mode).
3. If Word opens in Safe Mode, disable add-ins one at a time
   • In Word, go to File > Options > Add-Ins.
   • In the Manage list, select Word Add-ins or COM Add-ins, then select Go.
   • Clear one add-in, select OK, then restart Word normally.
   • If Word works, the disabled add-in is the cause.
   • Older add-ins known to cause problems include Abbyy FineReader, PowerWord, and Dragon Naturally Speaking.
4. If Word does not open in Safe Mode, repair Office
   • Run an Office repair.
   • Start with Quick Repair. If that does not fix it, use Online Repair.
5. Update Windows device drivers
   • On Windows 11: Start > Settings > Windows Update > Check for updates.
   • On Windows 10: Start > Settings > Update & security > Windows Update > Check online for updates from Microsoft Update.

If the issue is specifically that Word opens but everything is locked or read-only, Word may have lost activation status. In that case, sign out of Word, quit it completely, reopen it, and sign in again with the Microsoft account that has the Microsoft 365 subscription.

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