Cannot open Word document

Question

I saved a chapter of my new book as usual in OneDrive a couple of days ago.

Today, I tried to open the file, and I get this message:

The document seems to have problems.

When I try to open the local file from my hard disk I get this:

I cannot:

• open locally
• open from cloud
• export to pdf
• anything that I tried

Also, it can be opened from my phone with no issues! but when I send it to my email or share it again I get the 2nd image I attached!

what is going on?

I cannot believe that I lost so many hours of work in 2025 when saving both locally and in MS cloud!!!

Answer 1

Hello Perry. Thanks for reaching out. My name is Diana. I'm an independent advisor and a Microsoft fan like you.

It appears that you have saved your document in OneDrive as usual, then you still have an option to get the version of files that is not corrupted through OneDrive version history.

To do that, go to OneDrive.com > my files > locate where your document > right click > version history > check each history that you saved couple days ago and if its open fine without any issue > download it locally then try to open it on desktop.

I look forward to your feedback,

Answer 2

I have created complicated drwaings of decision trees and stuff like that that I want to recover... They took days to create...

Answer 3

Try to opening in google docs. Also you can do one thing, you can recover text from file but this may recover raw text but lose formatting.