How to Repair Corrupted MS Word Files [Document Recovery]

Find answers on this page to how to recover severely corrupted Word file that can open or cannot open in Word 2003 ~ Word 2019 and Word included with Microsoft 365. All the given methods are based on manual operations and Microsoft support without using third-party Word repair utilities. If you wish to repair Word documents that won't open after performing a recovery, use EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard on your PC.

Corruption issues in Microsoft Word are not strange at all. Compared with how to recover unsaved Word documents, which some professional file recovery software can do well, repairing a corrupted file requires more patience and skills. The more severely the File gets damaged, the more complex the file content can be restored. Despite that, some fixable ways are still available for a corrupted Word .doc/.docx file. To help you fully understand how to recover corrupted Word file in Windows 10/8.1/8/7 with confidence, we offer 8 practical fixes:

What Makes A Word Document Corrupt - Badly?

Anytime you cannot open a file normally, you should suspect file corruption. In addition, even if you can open the File, the data shows a weird character or Word document turns to gibberish, indicating that the file data has been partially or entirely damaged. How did you note the file problem? Have you ever done the following things before the event? If yes, that's probably the reason.

• 🔌Abrupt Power failure or system shutdown while editing, downloading, or transferring the File.
• ↔️Change the Word file format too frequently from one format to the other
• 💽Read/write the Word file on a hard drive with too many bad sectors
• 🦠The computer has been infected by malware and viruses
• 📃The Microsoft Word application crashes froze, or the Word document becomes blank.

How to Recover Corrupted Word File with 8 Simple Tricks

There is no guaranteed way to 100% protect a computer file from being lost or ruined unless you make a real-time backup. When you happen to receive a file error reporting the File in Word has been corrupted, you should take the right action to repair the corruption without delay.

🔎Scenario - The Word File Does Not Open from the Start

The file error followed by a Word file you cannot open at the moment is usually about "The file is corrupted and cannot be opened." The four solutions are generally helpful in fixing this kind of not-opening issue.

Fix 1. Repair Word with Software

This given method is based on manual operations and Microsoft office support without using third-party Word repair tools. If you wish to repair Word documents that won't, use EaseUS Fixo Document Repair on your PC. It works with the ability to repair corrupted Word documents after recovery or that seemingly cannot open.

Here are the steps to utilize this EaseUS file repair tool:

Step 1. Download and launch Fixo on your PC or laptop. Choose "File Repair" to repair corrupted Office documents, including Word, Excel, PDF, and others. Click "Add Files" to select corrupted documents.

Step 2. To repair multiple files at once, click the "Repair All" button. If you want to repair a single document, move your pointer to the target file and choose "Repair". You can also preview the documents by clicking the eye icon.

Step 3. Click "Save" to save a selected document. Select "Save All" to save all the repaired files. Choose "View Repaired" to locate the repaired folder.

Let us learn 7 more different ways to repair corrupted Word documents. Before that, don't forget to mark this passage by sharing it on Facebook, Twitter, or SNS.

If you don't want to use software, it is ok. You can watch this video and refer to the fixes. However, if your Word document is severely corrupted, only the professional software can repair and save it.

• 00:00 Introduction
• 00:14 Method 1. Insert to a new Word document
• 00:38 Method 2. Use open and repair
• 00:55 Method 3. Default settings
• 01:30 Method 4. EaseUS Fixo Document Repair

Fix 2. Open the File in Draft Mode

• Open Word and navigate to "View" and then "Draft"
• Select "File" > "Options" > "Advanced"
• First, find the "Show document content section", check the box in front of "Use draft font in Draft and Outline views", and "Show" picture placeholders.

• Go on scrolling down to the section of "General", uncheck the options of "Update automatic links at open" and select "OK," and then close Word.
• Restart Word and select the damaged document to open.

Fix 3. Open the File with "Recover Text from Any File"

Do does not use the double-click method to open the File because it will prevent you from opening it correctly in Word. Instead, use the available feature in Word like this.

• Open Word and go to "File"> "Open" > "Browse".

• Select the problematic Word document by navigating to its file location and select "Recover Text from Any File (*.*)" from the dropdown menu
• Click "Open"

Fix 4. Insert the File in a New Document

This method takes two procedures creating a new Word file and fixing the Word found unreadable content. 

• Select the "File" menu, and then select "New"
• Select "Blank document", and then select "Create"
• On the "Insert" tab, select Insert Object, and then choose "Text From File".

• In the Insert File dialog box, locate and select the damaged document. Then, choose "Insert".

🔎Scenario - Able to Open the Word File but Data Corrupt

The other case is that you can open the File in the usual way in Word but stop by some unspecified errors. The content may consist of unreadable characters and the formatting and layout are in a mass. You must use different methods to tackle this kind of issue.

Fix 5. Use the Open and Repair Word Tool

• In Word, select "File" on the "Ribbon", and then select "Open"
• In the "Open" dialog box, click once to highlight your Word document
• Select the arrow on the "Open" button, and then choose "Open" and "Repair"

Fix 6. Copy Content Except for the Last Paragraph to a New Document

Copy only the plain text between the section breaks if your document contains section breaks. Do not copy the section breaks.

• In Word, select "File" and then choose "New"
• Select "Blank document", and then select "Create"
• Next, choose "File" and then select "Open"
• Select the damaged paper, and then select "Open"
• Copy the contents of the document, and then paste the contents into the new Microsoft Word

Besides, when a system problem causes Word document damage or other file corruption, you can use Text Recovery Converter Word to repair as much information as possible.

Fix 7. Start Word from Default Settings

Run Word using the default settings can exclude the factors of some add-in and NOrmal.dotm template issues that cause your Word repaired file to constantly corrupt.

• Close all the Word documents on your PC
• Press the Windows+R keys to open "Run"
• Type winword.exe /a and click "OK"

• Once Word opens up, go to "File" and click on "Open"
• Browse to the damaged Word file and click on "Open"

Fix 8. Adopt the Document View to Remove Damaged Data

If the pages of a document are truncated, it may help remove the damaged content by switching the document view. First of all, open the corrupted document and scroll down page by page to check "which page number" (try to write it down on a notebook) has damaged content that is causing the document to be truncated. Then, switch views to remove the damaged content as follows.

• Select "Web Layout" or "Draft view" on the "View" tab in the Document Views group.

• Scroll to view the content that was displayed before the document appeared to be truncated
• Select and delete the next paragraph, table, or object in the File
• On the "View" tab in the Document Views group, select "Print Layout". If the document continues to appear to be truncated, continue to switch views and delete content until the File no longer seems to be truncated in the Print Layout view
• Save the document

Are you having more issues not mentioned on this page? Check the links for further help.

Tips for Preventing the Word Documents from Corruption

• Before using Fixo to fix Word documents, please shut any open Word windows to prevent conflict between the apps that make up this Word file repair utility;
• Always remove the cord safely while attempting to unplug external devices from computers if you are utilizing them to save your papers;
• Keep a USB in place at all times when transferring Word documents to or from a computer. Data corruption could result from this.

Conclusion

Choose one of the alternatives to open and recover corrupted Word documents. Install the EaseUS Fixo on your PC, and you'll finish the work properly in no time if you're looking for the most expedient way to fix the mistake. The Word files will be repaired expertly by this robust and simple tool.