Microsoft Word may delete your files — here’s how to avoid it

There’s a new bug in Microsoft Word that may delete your files, and according to user reports, they’re not always recoverable through the Recycle Bin. Fortunately, Microsoft is aware of the problem, but it’s unclear when the issue might be fixed. If you want to make sure that your files stay safe, we’ve got a few workarounds to help you out.

In the last few days, the Microsoft community boards have been flooded with reports where people complained about their files randomly being deleted, with one user saying: “I use Word. Today, it deleted eight hours of work.” Further reports quickly made it clear that the affected files have a few things in common.

The bug occurs when you save a file locally and the file name contains the # symbol or the file extension is capitalized. This means using .DOCX or .RTF instead of lower-case .docx and .rtf. This only happens in Word for Microsoft 365, version 2409. If you’re running an older version, you should be safe — but backing up your data is always a good idea.

There’s more. Microsoft, having acknowledged the problem, found that not all files get deleted (even if they meet the above criteria). The trigger is closing Word and being prompted to save instead of saving manually and then closing the program.

If this happens to you, start by checking the bin — the file might be there. You can also try a few other recovery methods outlined in our guide. However, your best bet is preventing the file from actually being deleted.

To prevent the issue, try the following:

• Save the file manually before closing Word
• Don’t use the symbol # in the file name
• Use lower-case file extensions
• In Word, go into File > Options > Save, and then enable Don’t show the Backstage when opening or saving files with keyboard shortcuts
• Roll back to a previous version of Word

This problem might only affect a small percentage of Word users, but deleting files is never a good thing. After all, losing hours of work is never fun. Let’s hope that Microsoft finds a fix soon, and until then, the above workarounds should help those affected.