Fix Problems with Microsoft Word Not Opening or Responding in Windows

Microsoft Word is a part of the Office suite of products from Microsoft. Currently, Word is available on multiple platforms in addition to Windows. Office for Mac, Mobile versions for Windows Mobile 10, Android and iOS are also available. However, as the title suggests, we would be focussing on Word 2013/2016 issues on Windows 7, 8.1 & 10. Since Microsoft Word is arguably the world’s most used “word processing” software, issues can arise and that is what we are going to address in this post. Common issues such as Microsoft Word Not Opening or responding can be easily solved by following a couple of steps. Read along to know more.

Solutions to Microsoft Word Not Opening or Responding

Option 1: There might be multiple reasons why your Word application is not opening. If the problem is specific to a word document and everything else is working fine, then follow the steps below:

• Step 1: Open Microsoft word and create a blank word document from the template.
• Step 2: From the top ribbon menu, on the “Insert tab” select “Object in the Text Group” and select “Text from File” (Top Right Hand Corner menu)
• Step 3: Browse to select the target word document and click to select “Insert“

Here are the screenshots below:

Option 2: If your word application is not opening at all. In this case, you can try the following options.

• Step 1: Go to the Windows Start Menu and Type “Run“. Alternatively, you can use “Windows Button + R” on your keyboard.
• Step 2: Type in “winword.exe /a” (The /a switch disables Add-Ons and Custom Templates to Load)
• Step 3: If step 2 fails, then go back to run and type “%userprofile%AppDataRoamingMicrosoftTemplates“
• Step 4: Right click on the “Normal.Dotm” and select rename. Rename the file to something like “OldNormal.Dotm“
• Step 5: Close everything and rerun word.

Here are the screenshots below for your reference:

Option 3: If the first and second option did not work out for you, try deleting the Word data registry entry from the Windows registry. See below:

Step 1: Go To Start>Run> Type “REGEDIT.EXE” and click “Yes” if Windows security is prompted.

Step 2: Click on File>Export and save a copy of the registry if things don’t go well.

Step 3: Delete the registry entry “HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftOffice16.0WordDataOptions” for Word 2016 users.

Step 4: Try Opening Word again and see if it is working.

Try the Registry option only if you are an advanced user. If the wrong entry is deleted, Windows might get corrupted.

See the screenshot below:

I hope this was helpful for basic word troubleshooting steps. If you want a more detailed troubleshooting steps, head over to the Microsoft Official article to know more. Do drop us a comment below in the comment section for any feedback or suggestions.