Fixed: Issue with Recent Documents not showing in Word 2013 and 2016 on Windows 10/8/7

How do I find recently opened documents in Microsoft Word? To locate recently opened documents in Microsoft Word, follow these steps: 1. Launch the Word application. 2. In the top-left corner of the program interface, click on "File" (or "Microsoft Office Button" in older versions). 3. From the dropdown menu, select "Open." In some versions of Word, you might see "Recent Documents" listed directly under the "File" menu. 4. You will see a list displaying the documents you've recently opened or edited, often with date and time information. 5. Click on the document you wish to open, and it will load in Word. If you're using Word for Mac, the process is similar: 1. Open the Word application. 2. Click on the "Word" menu at the top of the screen, then choose "Open." 3. In the opening window's left sidebar, you'll see a "Recent" section. 4. Click on the desired document, and it will open immediately. Please note that Word needs to have saved the files previously for them to appear in the "Recent Documents" list. If a file hasn't been saved, it may not be displayed.

"In the past, when I opened Microsoft Office Word on Windows 10, the list of recently used files would always appear through File > Open. This time, it didn't."

"Excel, Notepad, and PowerPoint are working fine, but the 2016 version of Word is no longer showing recent documents. I don't know what happened, and I need assistance to restore the missing recent documents list so I can continue using this feature."

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The "Recent Documents" option is considered a convenient way for Microsoft Office users to quickly access saved files, such as Word, Excel, or PowerPoint documents. It also helps you locate and access a Word document when you can't find it on your local PC drive.

However, according to some MS Office Word users, the Recent Documents option might be missing from the Word app. If this issue is happening on your Windows PC, don't worry. In the lines below, you're going to learn what causes the 'Recent Documents' option to disappear in Word and how to get it back in Word 2016/2013.

Why isn't the Recent Documents list appearing in Word?

To get your missing Recent Documents list back in Windows, you first need to figure out the reason it's not showing up. There are typically three reasons why the Recent Documents list might be missing from the Word application:

# 1. The most recent Word file has been manually removed from the Recent Documents list.

Microsoft Office lets you remove individual files from the Recent Documents list by selecting “Remove from List.” This does not, in fact, remove the file from your system unless you press Delete.

If you've manually removed or deleted a recently opened or edited Word document from the Recent Documents list, you'll have to locate and open the Word file on your local drive or external storage device.

# 2. Microsoft Office Word has signed out without an MS account

If you have ever signed into Word 2013 or 2016 with your Microsoft Office account while editing a document, the app logs all your actions and changes to your MS account.

As a result, you might lose some records when you sign out of your MS account in MS Word, such as the Recent Documents list.

# 3. The Recent Documents list is disabled

By default, the Recent Documents list in Microsoft Office Word is usually enabled. However, due to misclicks or personal preferences, some users might disable this feature to speed up the performance of Microsoft Office Word on their computers. If that's the case, the next section will provide a solution to this problem.

Read on, check the applicable solutions, and apply the appropriate one to get your recent Word document back in the list.

How to Recover Recently Opened Word Documents in Windows 10/8/7

In this part, we will introduce some practical solutions for you to recover the missing Recent Documents list in Word 2013/2016. The provided methods also work for other versions of Microsoft Office applications, such as MS Excel, PPT, Word 2010, etc.

Fix 1: Sign in with an MS account to show Recent Documents in Word

If you previously signed out of your MS account, try signing in again with your Microsoft Office account to display the missing list of recent documents:

Step 1: Open a blank Word document, click the “Sign In” in the top-right corner, and then choose “Yes” to allow Office to connect to the Internet.

Step 2: Sign in using your email address or phone number, then tap “Next” to proceed.

Step 3: Type your password, and then click Sign in to sign in to your MS account.

Step 4: You can now open a new Word document and select “File” > “Open” > “Recent Documents.”

If any recent Word files are listed, congratulations – you can access and open these files directly from this list. If nothing is displayed, you'll need to enable the “Recent Documents” list first.

Fix 2: Disable and re-enable the Recent Documents feature

If the “Recent Documents” feature is disabled, you won't see anything listed in the “Open” tab in MS Word 2013 or 2016. Try disabling this feature first, and then re-enabling it within Word using the new settings:

Step 1: Disable the 'Recent Documents' Feature in Word

1. Open Word 2013/2016, and click "File" > "Options" > "Advanced."

2. In the "Display" section, set "Number of recent files to show" to "0" and uncheck "Quick access to this number of recently used files."

Step 2. Re-enable the Recent Documents feature in MS Word

1. Open Word's Advanced options by opening a new Word document and clicking "File," "Options," and then "Advanced."

2. Select the number "0," "10," "15," "25," or any other number of your choosing next to "Show recent documents." If you set this to 0, then no recent documents will show up in this space.

3. Check “Show this number of recently used files” and change the “0” to “10,” “15,” “25,” or another number of your choice.

Step 3: Click OK to save all changes, and then restart the Word application.

Then, you can open a new Word file, go to File > Open > Recent Documents, and check the list for your missing Word file.

Additional Tip: Recovering Missing or Lost Word Documents

Once a Word document is added to the Recent Documents list, you can quickly access and open it from there. If MS Word isn't showing the Word file you want, don't worry. Try searching your computer for the document name, or check your trash can to see if the file is there.

If it comes up empty, your Word file is likely missing or lost. In that case, your best bet to recover a recently lost or missing document is with reliable Office file recovery software.

The Data Recovery Wizard tool can help. It recovers files lost due to any reason in 3 simple steps:

Step 1: Select the location of the Word file

Select the drive or a particular folder where you lost your Word document and click on the “Scan” button.

Step 2: Locate your Word document

The software will immediately start scanning all lost data from the selected drive. Once done, click on the “Documents” option from the left panel. Select the targeted Word file from the scan results and then hit “Preview”.

Step 3: Recover the deleted Word document

Once the scan is finished, check the Word files you need, then click “Recover.” Make sure to save the recovered documents in a different location than the original one.

More frequently asked questions about words and their usage.

On this page, we provide two methods to resolve the issue of Recent Documents not showing in Word 2013 and 2016. We also offer an additional tip to help you recover lost or deleted Word documents from your computer.

Here, we've also gathered some common issues related to MS Word documents. If you're interested in any of them, keep reading, and you might find the answer you're looking for or a satisfactory solution to your problem:

Question 1: How can I find my recent documents in Windows 10?

Answer: Windows 10 no longer has the "Recent Documents" option. However, you can still view all of your recent files through "Quick Access" on your computer.

Press the Windows key + E > Open File Explorer > Select "Quick Access" > Look under "Recent files" to see all the files or documents you've recently opened.

Question 2: How do I search for recently opened documents in Word?

Your list of recent documents is located under the "File" menu in Microsoft Word. To access it, you need to launch the Word application and then click on "File" > "Open" > "Recent Documents." This will display the list of your most recently used documents.

Click the document to open it. If you don't see anything under Recent Documents, try the solutions on this page to fix the issue.

Question 3: How can I recover an unsaved Word document?

Microsoft Office already has this feature, which automatically saves unsaved documents in case Word or Excel crashes. To recover an unsaved Word file, simply restart the Word application > go to "File" > "Open" > click on "Recover Unsaved Documents" > select the unsaved file, and save it as a .doc or .docx file in a secure location.

If you have more questions on how to recover a lost or closed Word file without saving, refer to this link for more detailed solutions: 3 Ways to Recover unsaved Word documents in Windows 10.

If you have more questions, feel free to try searching on our website (https://www.tools.com) using the search option, or visit the How-To Guides page for more solutions.