I Accidentally Deleted Microsoft Word From My Mac

8 min readJun 9, 2021

Apr 02, 2020 I have installed a newer version of Word on my Mac laptop, Office for Mac. Microsft asks me to sign in. WHen I — Answered by a verified Mac Support Specialist We use cookies to give you the best possible experience on our website. Sep 25, 2011 I accidently deleted my microsoft word. How can I get it back? — Answered by a verified Tech Support Specialist. I accidently deleted my Microsoft Works program, so now I can’t locate Word or Excel. The Expert answered my Mac question and was patient. He answered in a thorough and timely manner, keeping the response on a level that could.

FonePaw — Solution — Recovery — Recover Word Document on Mac

Losing a word document could give you a heart attack. The lost document may be an assignment, a report or article that you have been working for days, weeks or even months. Sometimes, the Word crashed or your Mac suddenly shut off, leaving the Word document you are working on unsaved. Or you accidentally saved over a Word document on Mac, thus the document is overwritten. Even worse, the lost Word document might has been deleted by mistake.

Whether you need to recover an unsaved or deleted Word document on Mac, this article can give you some hints. Read the methods below to recover Word document on Mac.

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How to Recover Unsaved Word Document 2019/2017/2016/2011 on Mac

The good news is that by default, Word on Mac enables an autosave feature which automatically save the document you are working on every 10 minutes in the AutoRecovery folder. It is very likely that you can recover the document that you didn’t save with the autosave files.

Note: The prerequisite for Word AutoRecover to work on Mac is that you have saved the document for at least one time. That is to say, if you just create a Word file, make some edits and then close the file by clicking Don’t Save, there is no available AutoRecover file to recover the unsaved document.

If Word or Mac system crashed

After an application(such as Microsoft Office) crashes or macOS freezes, the next time you open Word, an AutoRecover file will be automatically opened and you can save it and pick up where you left off.

In the ideal world, you should see the unsaved document right after you relaunch Word. However, if things doesn’t work as expected, you can find Word’s autosave location on Mac and automatically recover the unsaved document.

AutoRecover files in Word 2011 for Mac

To recover unsaved Word document on Word 2011 on Mac, there are two ways.

1. Open AutoRecover files

Step 1 On Word, click File > AutoRecover.

Step 2 You should be seeing a list of AutoRecover files. According the saving date, open the unsaved file you are looking.

2. Locate AutoRecovery folder on Mac

Step 1 Open Finder.

Step 2 Press Alt key while clicking Go to reveal Library folder.

Step 3 Go to the Word autosave location: Library/Application Support/ Microsoft/Office/Office 2011 AutoRecovery.

AutoRecover files in Word 2016/2017 for Mac

There are also two methods to recover a Word document that was not saved on Mac for Word 2016, 2017 or newer.

1. Go to Microsoft User Data folder

Step 1 Close Microsoft Word on Mac.

Step 2 Open Finder > Documents > Microsoft User Data folder.

Step 3 Look through the files that are named ‘AutoRecovery save of’ and find the autosave files you need.

If you have problem in opening the AutoRecover Word files, rename the files and add ‘.doc’ to the file extension.

2. Go to AutoRecovery folder

Step 1 Open Finder. Click Go > Go to folder.

Step 2 Enter the path as follow:

~/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Word/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery.

If you fail to recover unsaved Word documents with AutoRecover files, you can also check temporary folder on Mac, which may contain the files you are looking for.

Recover unsaved Word document with Mac Temporary folder

Step 1 Launch Terminal with Spotlight or go to Applications > Utilities.

Step 2 Enter the command line: open $TMPDIR. Hit Enter.

Step 3 The temporary folder will be open. Check if there is the Word document that you didn’t save.

Accidentally Saved Over a Word Document on Mac

When you accidentally saved over a Word document that you actually need on Mac, you can try to recover the Word document from AutoRecovery folder. And if it doesn’t work, try to recover the previous version of the document from Time Machine backups on Mac.

Step 1 Open Time Machine with Spotlight.

Step 2 Find the files you want to restore.

Step 3 Click Restore Uninstall microsoft update mac. to restore the Word file.

How to Recover Lost/Deleted Word Documents on Mac

If you have Word documents that you have deleted mistakenly, FonePaw Data Recovery can recover the deleted Word documents for you. And sometimes, when you cannot find the unsaved documents from AutoRecovery folder, you may use the program to see if it can scan out the files that you need.

And after a Word document is deleted or lost, you should run FonePaw Data Recovery as soon as possible because the deleted document can be covered by new data on your Mac anytime. A rule of thumb for successful data recovery is Act Fast.

DownloadDownload

Step 1 Run FonePaw Data Recovery for Mac.

Step 2 To recover deleted Word documents from Mac drive, click Documents and select the drive that the deleted Word files were saved. Click Scan.

Step 3 The program will begin to scan and find the deleted documents on the drive, which include deleted Word, Excel, PDF, PPT and more.

Step 4 When the scanning stops, click DOC or DOCX and view if the deleted files you need are found. If not, click Deep Scan to find the deleted files are buried deeper.

Step 5 When you see the Word files you want to recover, click Recover.

Tips: Avoid Data Loss in Word for Mac

Set a shorter AutoRecover interval. By default, Word automatically save a copy of the Word document you are working on every 10 minutes. You can shorten the interval. On Word, go to Preferences > Output > Sharing > Save > Save every XX minute. For example, enter 5 to save a Word document every 5 minute.

Enable AutoSave if you are subscribed to Word for Office 365. With AutoSave enable, Word saves the changes you made every few seconds so you don’t need manually click the Save button. Even if Word crashes unexpectedly, most changes on a document are saved automatically.

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Mar 09,2020 • Filed to: Solve Mac Problems • Proven solutions

Case 1: I accidentally deleted a Word document on my Mac.
Case 2: Word document files unexpectedly closes and aren’t saved.
Case 3: I lost my Word document on Mac due to the sudden shutdown or crash.

Word document accidentally deleted or lost before saving? When it happens, you can first go to the Mac Trash to restore them to the original location. If not, take it easy. In this article, we will offer the best 3 ways to help you recover lost, deleted or unsaved Word document on Mac.

Way 1 How to Recover Deleted or Lost Word Document on Mac

Your Word files can be deleted or lost due to careless or wrong deletion, Option-Shift-Command-Delete or Shift-Command-Delete clicking, system crash, virus attack, hard drive formatting, hard drive corruption and more. Regardless of the causes, we can surely tell you that ‘Yes, you can recover a deleted or lost Word document’. As long as you get a powerful Mac data recovery software, you can easily and quickly recover Word document.

Accidentally Uninstalled Microsoft Word

1. Recoverit — The Best Software for Word Document Recovery

As for the powerful Word document recovery tool, we recommend Recoverit Data Recovery for Mac. This file recovery program is safe and reliable. It can easily and effectively help you recover deleted or lost Word document files on Mac and Windows, even your Word document files are not saved. Follow the next guide to recover deleted, lost or unsaved Word document on Mac.

2. How to Recover Deleted or Lost Word Document on Mac

In this section, we’re going to provide the specific solution for deleted or lost Word file recovery on Mac. If you’re searching for a solution on Windows, please download the Windows version and take the same steps.

Video Guide to Word Document Recovery on Mac

How Do I Recover a Deleted or Lost Word Document

Google Docs

Free download and install Recoverit Mac Data Recovery on your computer. Follow the next steps to perform deleted files recovery on Mac. Just in 3 steps and minutes, you can get lost files back instantly.

Select a Word file location
Scan for lost Word files
Preview and recover Word document

If you just find your Word document won’t be opened, don’t worry. We also offer 4 solutions for you. Turn to this page and fix ‘Microsoft Word Won’t Open on Mac’.

Way 2AutoRecovery: How to Recover Unsaved Word Document on Mac

For Word documents not saved promptly, there are also some methods to help get them back. The first method is AutoRecovery. Microsoft Word has an auto save function, which saves your data in a specified folder. In this method, you don’t need any Word recovery software. Now, what we’re going to do is accessing that folder to retrieve your lost files. Follow the steps:

Access this path Finder/Go/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Office/Office 2011 AutoRecovery. Please bear in mind that you have to press the ‘Option’ key while clicking ‘Go’ in finder to be able to access ‘Library’ folder which is usually hidden;
Once you see your file, open it;
Save your file in any location;
You have successfully recovered your file.

Way 3TMP Folder: Recover Word Document Not Saved on Mac

The last way you can resort to for Mac Word document recovery is to open Temporary folder with Terminal.

Find and open ‘Terminal’ in Utilities.
Type ‘open $TMPDIR’ and press ‘Enter’.
Find and open the TMP Folder named ‘TemporaryItems’
Select and save the unsaved Word documents you want.

Usually, your Word document not saved promptly should be in the temporary folder on Mac. If you do not find them, that’s because you have deleted them or clean up the folder.

To Wrap Up

It doesn’t matter which method you are using to perform lost or deleted Word files recovery on Mac as long as you can get your files back. However, if you lost your files and can’t get them back with the Office features, then I suggest you use the Recoverit Word File Recovery Software. It is a truely reliable and workable tool to help you recover Word document on Mac. Keynote files recovery can be also done with it.

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