MS Word Recent Documents not showing? This article aims to help you solve this issue. You can also recover lost Word documents and get relevant recent documents tips.
Microsoft Office programs can default show the last few documents you opened in that software so that users can quickly access their recent files by clicking the corresponding link.
However, several users complained about their Microsoft Word Recent Documents not showing.
In the last few weeks, my Word has stopped showing the recently opened files when I right-click on the icon in the taskbar. It only showed three files I had not opened in a long time. I right-clicked on each of those three files and selected Removed from this list. But the list never populated again with more recent Word documents. Why did my Microsoft Word stop showing? Moreover, how do I fix this issue? Thanks.
- A user from Microsoft Community
Deletion is one of the possible reasons. If you’ve manually removed your needed recent document from the Recent Documents list like the above user, it definitely cannot show up. Logging out of the Microsoft accounts and disabling the Recent Documents feature also can prevent your Word Recent Documents from displaying.
If you’re eager to jump out of this dilemma and want to find Recent Documents in Word program, you’ve come to the right place.
In addition, you can get more details on how to find AutoSaved documents in Excel programs.
Are your Microsoft Word Recent Documents not showing up? Check two feasible fixes below.
Microsoft account connects all your Microsoft apps and devices. When you sign in with the same account, your Microsoft Word program will automatically record and sync all the changes and modifications.
On the contrary, your modifications will not be recorded if you’ve edited partial Word documents after signing out of the MS account. Then you might lose some recent Word document recordings.
If it happens to be your case, please refer to the following steps to re-appear your Word Recent Documents.
Step 1. Open a blank Word document and click “Sign in” at the top right corner. Then click the “OK” button.
Step 2. Enter your Microsoft account (Email address or phone number) and click “Next” to go on.
Step 3. Enter your Microsoft account password.
Step 4. After opening a Word file, click File > Open > the Recent Documents panel list to check all your accessible recent Word documents.
In general, the Recent Documents feature is turned on by default. But some users prefer to improve their Microsoft Word program performance by turning off this feature or reducing the number of shown recent documents.
If your Word Recent Documents not showing up in Taskbar because of these two factors, you can show or increase this number of Recent Documents via the following steps.
Step 1. Open a new Word document, then click File > Options to enter the interface of Word Options.
Step 2. Under the Advanced tab, set a number in the box beside Show this number of Recent Documents. Please remember to click “OK” to save these changes.
If the above fixes cannot work as expected, which implies your recent Word documents might have been deleted or removed from your hard drive.
Before overwritten, there exists a possibility to recover deleted & lost Word documents from hard drives. So you’re supposed to avoid adding new documents to your computer.
Are you unwilling to be restricted by necessary backups? Or even there’s no backup for you? If you’re bothered by similar matters, the most efficient and effort-saving way is to seek assistance from professional data recovery software like MyRecover.
How to recover lost Word documents without backups? Download MyRecover on your Windows 11, 10, 8, 7, or Server PC to retrieve them!
Step 1. Launch MyRecover and hover the mouse over the hard drive that includes your wanted Word documents. Then click Scan.
Step 2. Filter your needed Word documents according to Document Type, Name, Date, or Path.
Step 3. Go to the Deleted Files/Recycle Bin/Other Missing Files folder and select the Word files you want. Then click “Recover x files” to start the Word document recovery process.
If your Microsoft Word documents not showing, please refer to the above content to fix this issue. Meanwhile, there’re some related tips about Windows recent files.
The following three easy ways can help you find recently saved documents on Windows 10 or 11 computer.
In this scenario, there’re four feasible solutions for your reference. If your Windows 10 doesn’t show recent files, these fixes also are useful.
Check the corresponding solutions to find Recent Documents in Word and recover lost Word documents from this passage. Besides, you can get relevant recent document tips.
To prevent data loss at the source, it’s time for you to create regular backups using this free backup software for Windows, AOMEI Backupper.