After I installed the latest Windows Updates this morning, I got home and noticed that Microsoft Word 2007 would crash every single time I opened Word. To make matters worse, Word would also crash every time I tried to exit the program.
Lovely conundrum.
After an hour of frustration and a giggle at the appropriately titled Word 2007 crashes aren’t a bug, they’re a feature, it occurred to me that I went through this exact issue some time last year. A quick hunt through my del.icio.us bookmarks revealed the answer in the form of the Microsoft Knowledge Base’s article about crashes in Word 2007, Word 2003 and Word 2002.
The issue is with a corrupted key in the registry. The steps to fix this problem are:
- Exit all Office programs.
- Open the Registry Editor by selecting Start, Run, type regedit, and then select OK.
- Locate the following registry subkey: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Word\Data
- Delete the Data subkey (select Data, then select Delete from the Edit menu).
- Exit Registry Editor.
- Start Word. Ta da!
Hopefully this will save you some hours of frustration!
155 comments ↓
Or you could just refrain from using Windows
(bugger, I sound like one of those bitter anti-M$ people!
@Pat lol, Windows does have its use. One of the primary reasons for not switching to the Mac OS is that I’ve been using a tablet for quite a few years now. Until Apple is able to bring out a tablet that surpasses the form and functions of my tablet, I’ll seriously consider making the switch.
The issue is with a corrupted key in the registry. – Thanks a lot, big help. Your suggestion fixed my long and frustrating problem with MS Word 2007.
Thanks again.
@John Glad that it helped!
Thank you so much!!!
@Woojin Park no worries. Hope it all worked out.
Thank You!!!!!!!!!!!!
The last time I had similar problems with Word, it took me hours to fix. And many of those hours were spent with Microsoft tech support on the telephone. Ugh!
You save me many hours of frustration.
Thank You!!!!
Coincidentally, my computer was automatically restarted from a Windows update (installed automatically). I suspect the update included something that adversely affected Word.
Hi Denise, glad to hear that it’s been fixed and has saved you hours of frustration!
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I have been searching for days for a solution to this problem. I had the same problem a few months ago and found the solution online but did not bookmark it. I had a windows update a few days ago that I feel strongly sent word back into inoperative mode.
Now I can continue with my work. Again thank you!
Hi Linda, glad to be of help!
Thanks so much! That solved that annoying problem.
This was an immense help. I had already updated my XP o/s, installed all latest office updates, and looked through forum/knowledgebase info but nothing had helped.
Fortunately I ran into this before I spent more hours w/ Microsoft!
Hi Dave and Greg, glad to hear that this has helped!
Thanks so much for posting this information…I’ve been trying to figure out what’s been wrong all morning with my Word 2007 (running on Vista), and Microsoft’s “diagnostic” was no help at all. Thanks again…
Sorry but this hasn’t fixed the issue for me. This started when I tried to open up a document that I edit every day. For some reason Word (2007) crashed. Now every time it tries to recover this and Word crashes.
Hi K, glad that it worked for you.
Steve – I’m not sure why it didn’t work for you. Hope you find a way to stop it from crashing.
Thank you – youre the best!!!
Glad that it worked for you Adam!
Thanks a lot!! It saved me so much time and eliminated so much frustration. I actually reinstalled MS office 2007 enterprise and it didn’t fix the crashing problem. After I saw this solution, I tried it and No more crash!! Thx!!
You’re welcomed Beza!
Oh My God I Love you for this!!!!! Thank you, it worked!!! I thought I was screwed for sure
I’m sitting at a Borders near the University of Georgia trying to type a 20 page philosophy seminar research paper for my doctoral program, and Windows updated my computer and crashed Word, sending me in a panic. I just fixed the problem per your instructions, and I thought you should know. Thank you so much for this post!
you. are. a legend. and have just saved my dissertation and sanity. therefore you are contributing to my degree. i thank u. my mother thanks u. my fathers wallet thanks u. even my coffee supplier thanks u.
Hi Ella, I’m glad that your dissertation was ok! Good luck with the rest of the degree.
Ruth,
Well, almost a year later, your fix is still “da bomb!” My wife is a nursing instructor, and was required to “upgrade” our home computer to Office 2007 in order to grade her students’ research projects. Of course, immediately after switching to Office 2007, Word began its’ “crash on save” routine. Some dim memory of reading some of your work earlier stirred in my cobweb-ridden mind, I found your blog, edited the registry key, and in less than 30 seconds was done! Thanks a million!
Cheers
Jim and Jane
No worries Jim and Jane. Glad that it worked out :)
Thank you. That helped.
didn’t work for me…any other suggestions?
PERFECT!
Worked like a dream. Saved me who knows how many more months of aggrevation. Fixed.
Thanks a million!
Hi, I tried tis and it didn’t work for me. Word crashes every time I open a document and i’m getting really upset now!
Hi Nancy and Jillos, what operating system are you running and which version of Word?
Great solution! I’ve been trying to figure this out for a week!
Glad it worked Jason.
Thanks for this , it was great help to me.
You’re welcomed Göran.
Word was crashing on exit every time. I did this and it fixed it. I had to do it for every user on the computers. Thanks.
THANK YOU!!!!!!
You’re welcomed Paul and Mat!
ty!
Thanks you, Ruth. This was very helpful and nipped my growing frustration in the bud. Much obliged.
Thx Ruth! This really helped :-)
You’re welcomed jorne, Greg and Rajarshi!
I was planning to uninsall word and re install it, and your problem has fixed it. I am really glad, and thank you.
It was affecting my work and productivity, as I had to load word in safe mode.
Glad that it worked for you Jay.
Worked like a charm. Saved my day. Thanks!
Hey, thanks so much… I was working on a paper for my MBA class and thought I was done for! Thanks, worked perfectly!
thanks for the tip. its been driving me crazy.
well am going to check this because even i reinstalled the office and it didnt work, thanks again for the post and i hope that it works.
Regards,
Thank you!! So cool to be able to surf and find an answer so easily simply because someone like you took the time to document the solution for us all. Good to have your blog around–keep up the great work. Thanks again!
Just posted your tip on my blog: “Fixing Microsoft Word 2007 crashing feature – Easy Fix from @RuthEllison” (http://twitthis.com/xk5fxg)
Thanks for the comments everyone. Glad it helped you!
@Jim Parker – thanks for the link to your blog!
Thanks for the tip. It appears to have helped a lot of people.
Unfortunately, it isn’t working for me. I have a huge document (600 pages, 265K words) that was converted from Word 2003. Still crashes every few minutes. Doubled RAM and increased page file size to be sure plenty available. Still dies during save or autorecover and sometimes deletes the file altogether. :(
Thanks for that, fixed word that repair wouldnt fix and as an added bonus for me fixed a page that was hanging consistently for months (for me) on my website. so its an ie 7 fix too in some circumstances ! Just need to fix why outlook 2007 is very slow(just looked and it seems to have speeded up to, but i may just be imagining that!)
i’ve seen this way to fix it on other websites but for some reason my registry doesnt have data as an option under Word. so i cant try it.. :(
Awesome tip. This also solved a problem I had in which Word 2007 would not open an associated file – I double-clicked, Word opened, but the file wasn’t there. I went through your simple steps and all is well!
Thanks.
Thx a lot ! It works!
Didn’t work for me either. I think I have the same problem as Steve Williams posted on on 10.09.08 at 12:00 am (see#15 above). The issue is that when i type anything into a Word 2007 document, even if it is a blank document, the program crashes, so basically Word is now completely useless. I tried deleting all the Normal.dot, .dotx and dotm files, but even after changing the registry as above, the problem still exists. Any other suggestions….I’m thinging of going over to OpenOffice!!!!
Thanks so much!!! You’re the best :)
Thanks a lot. Work like a charmed.
Super…after re-installing, getting Open Office etc etc, found this solution, and it worked a treat! Thanks so much!
Thank you very much! You saved me a bunch of trouble and i never thought a smooth solution would be available. I really appreciate that you take your time to help others like this.
Awesome!
Thanks a lot for this information! My Word 2007 was crashing on closing every single time for no apparent reason. This simple fix saved me lots of troubleshooting and reinstalling time.
Thank you very much. Very kind of you to have this enlightening piece of info on your blog.
Gratefully,
Sun Tzu
oh my god thats amazing. ive been strugling with word crashing every time i hit save for years. thankyou so much!!!!!
Glad that it has helped all of you. It’s helped me (again) recently when my Word kept crashing!
Thanks so much, Ruth! Second time with this issue, and you presented an easy, quick resolution (unlike MS)
I decided to keep your instructions for when they will be needed again (with MS, it is a certainty) and pasted them into a Word file by habit.
Then I had the “doink” moment, and made it into a pdf!
Thank you for saving me hours of frustration. Why do these things always happen when one has a project to finish! Luckily, yous as the first web site I found listing this problem. Would one ever need the registry fle again?
Thank you soooo much, you saved me from a nervous breakdown!!!
Brilliant!! Thanks so much! Saved me hours of researching.
That was too easy! Thanks so much!!!
Ruth,
Thank you so much. This is the third time I have needed to use this fix on two computers. Do you have any insight on why this problem occurs?
thanks a million… i spent hours trying to get it to work… you rock….
Hi Mark, sorry I’m not sure why the key gets corrupted but glad that the fix works for you!
Great help! This fixed it perfectly. Seemed to have the same problem after a Vista update. Thanks.
Thank you so much for this!! :)
I usually don’t write messages on blogs. But this saved the day for me….this problem had been driving me nuts.
Thank you so much!
Thanks, solved all the problems. I think it is a Vista only thing…can’t wait to upgrade to W7!
You are The Man!!!!
I just want to say a big THANK YOU for posting this simple fix. I can finally use Word again.
Super Solution Thank you.
Wow! It worked! thank you so much! It was so easy to fix!
Thanks!!!
It solved a huge problem
This is cool, it worked great
THANK YOU! Brilliant!
hi thanks so much!! rili helped my words from crashing. however considering that the data subkey was deleted..will there be any side effects?
@alvin – While I can’t guarantee the non existence of negative side effects, I’ve used this technique a few times now and didn’t have any trouble. Judging by the responses on this post, it looks like it’s ok for everyone else.
That worked for me with word on Win 7…thx
I get the problem 2 out of 3 times, so sometimes it just works. Tried the fix, still the same.
Faulting application name: WINWORD.EXE, version: 12.0.6514.5000, time stamp: 0x4a89d533
Faulting module name: ntdll.dll, version: 6.1.7600.16385, time stamp: 0x4a5bdadb
Exception code: 0xc0000374
Fault offset: 0x000c283b
Faulting process id: 0×710
Faulting application start time: 0x01ca6b6e71174442
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12\WINWORD.EXE
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\SYSTEM32\ntdll.dll
Report Id: b0b54ebc-d761-11de-a356-001b38146cb8
Funny thing is, it did this whilst on Win7 RC1 too, now clean install of Home Premium, reinstalled Office, same problem. Wonder if it’s hardware/driver related …
Your simple solution has saved me hours. Thank you so very much. Yet not sure what caused the data to be written, but certainly is not required for my functioning Word 2007.
THANK YOU. been trying to troubleshoot word 2007 for 1+ hour. Worked the first time. Back to school work… THANK YOU!!!!!
Hey, this problem has been driving me nuts in the past few months. I nearly formatted the hard drive! Thank you Thank you Thank you. Now to start writing up my MSc
S
What an easy fix to an utterly annoying problem. Way to go and THANK YOU!
Whilst this fix initially worked, Unfortunately the crashes started to re-occur and unfortunately deleting the data key does not fix the problem anymore, even if I import and then re delete the key!
Jonno – I’m not sure why it isn’t working for you. This problem has reoccurred for me while running windows 7. I went through the steps and it worked. Hope that you get it sorted out! Please let us know if you have an alternate solution for your problem as other readers may be interested in the response. Thanks.
@ #57&94, go delete add-ins such as math type then retry this solution should work. some of the “approved add-ins” actually rewrite or modify part of the program. you might have to delete add-ins, by going into word, click the office button, word options, then into manage add-ins, delete them, return your template to normal, then deleting the data thing as specified above. :)
YOU ARE AWESOME. seriously i love you.
It worked! Thank you! Office Diagnostics didn’t find a thing. I had a few leftover templates from a printer application. It didn’t work out so after removing the program it left a few entries that I couldn’t disable in Word. I checked the troublesome templates and now they’re gone. :D
it worked!
Thanks
You are the best!
thanks a bunch man!!! it works now! finally!
Why is this still not fixed in Feb 2010 ???
I did what you said and it worked.
THANKs
You posted this March 13th, 2008 and it fixed my problem on March 2th, 2010. Thank God you were the 1st topic I found in my Google search.
Thanks and thanks again!!
I’m glad there are smart people to help the rest of us out. Thanks!
Thank you, thank you, thank you, THANK YOU. This was driving me nucking futs- I even reinstalled and same problem. Your 30 second fix nailed it.
you are my hero
Thank you, thank you, thank you – that’s how many times I’ve had to use your fix. Now I’ve found out that when I install windows updates and restart the computer, I need to close all office programs before the restart. Hope others scroll down to read this.
do you keep the data file?
thanks for the help!
@Vanessa – What I’ve done is to keep the data file on my desktop (or chosen location) until I’m sure that Word has stabilised. It might stay on my desktop for a few weeks until I’m sure, then I delete it.
What you choose to do is up to you :)
Just wanted to say thanks for the informative post. Your sharing really saved me from more than a few temper-tantrums! :) Have a great day, and thanks again!
Hello,
I tried the work around which you have mentioned but i still keep getting the same failure each time i open a word document and exit the same.
I am running Windows 7 with Microsoft office 2007, please advise on the solution.
Many Thanks in advance.
Regards,
Pratyoosh.
That worked! Been meaning to fix this forever…Thank you!
I am indeed very grateful for your help… now I can finish my research paper… :)
Ruth, thank you!!!! Word crashing on every exit was so annoying!!! This worked like a champ! Simple and easy fix!!!
thank you it really works :), you saved me, I reinstalles all the office and the problem was there, but not anymore :)
Thank you so much. I have no idea what caused the corruption in the registry but deleting it seems to have done the trick.
Thanks for the tip!
Over two years after this article was first posted it’s still helping people around the world. Thanks for the help Ruth – big Karma credit coming your way for this one :)
You are the best. I discovered your page and fix in the 5th hour of a long and frustrating search. Silly me – I kept looking at official M$ content. Bless you!
I too want to thank you very much, i have windows 7 installed and there was an update done, rebooted and MS Word crashed upon exit. This has helped a great deal, thank you!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks for trying but it is only a temporary solution as one must continuously use your process to hopefully stop WORD from crashing.
I use PolyEdit word processor which one can download for free from their web site. Their PRO version is also very cheap. You will not believe how well it operates and never crashes.
@Anthony F – I’ve used it twice but I never had to continuously use it to stop Word from crashing. Do you find yourself having to use this solution consistently?
Hi…this didn’t work for me on two computers on which word has been crashing. On the first computer, I am using word 2003 and on the second word 2007. They have both been continuously crashing for several days now. I am at a loss as to what I should do…
IT WORKED! THANKS!
Yes — it continues to crash at random intervals not unlike Sarah’s problem. I simply got tired of using your solution (one of many) to temporarily correct the problem so I have solved the problem by downloading FREE Open Office, a free product from Oracle. One can get it all by going to openoffice.org: word processor, spreadsheet, presentation, draw and other programs. Its word program does everything that MS Word does.
I still use Excel which continues to work having never crashed.
Hello Ruth, It seems that it makes sense deleting the registry. I have been trying to sort this problem since 3-4 months now. BUT, unfortunately even this solution has not worked. I have even tried installing MS Office all again.. Word still keeps crashing. Please suggest if you have any other solution.
Hey Sarah, Anthony F and Pratik
Please refer to comment #96 (removal of add-ins and templates) and see if that makes a difference….
Cheers, Ruth
what if you registery doesn’t have a “data” directory under: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Word\data
You are a saint!! Thank youuuuuuuuuuu
thanks for the great and simple solution, to such an annoying problem!
by the way, @lavanya, delete the entire “data” folder…
thanks again.
I’m running Office 2010 on Vista and was experiencing random hangs and freezes on save. I’ve performed your fix and Word loads like lightning now and I havent had any freezes yet (touch wood), I noticed in the registry Office 2010 has all its registry key’s under a /14/ folder. I havent deleted the Data folder in under the /14/ folder instead i’ll wait to see how this fix pans out.
Hopefully this is the fix i’ve been looking for, thanks for sharing Ruth.
Thanks for providing information. This kind of steps are also some time suggested by online computer repair services.
OMG! Thank you so much, this has plagued me for months, and now I can finally use MS word without it crashing every five minutes.
ruth: that was a great help — like some of the others, have been suffering this for ages and was even advised at one point by a techie that i had to strip my pc back to basics etc — beyond my ken — but your 5-step fix was the perfect solution
ta da, indeed
best from scotland
Ruth: You solved my problem. I could do a save but could not do a Save As function. Now I can do it all. Thank you, Thank you.
Jim
We also had the crash issue. It started probably after we replaced our old servers with new ones.
Deleting the registry key fixed for us as well.
Many thx!
Thank you SO much! This has been a longtime problem between me and my Dell, and you’ve magically fixed it.
Thank you so so much!!
Thanks very much! Very helpful!
I’m so happy! Thank you so much for this – I’ve been living with Word crashing every time I close it for about 8 mths. Quite amazing it’s a 3 year-old problem that still crops up and my MS diagnostics doesn’t even see it
Unbelievable!
Thank you very much!
Wow…you are my hero! Thanks so much!
I cant believe that i’ve put up with this for so long… and not look for a solution for this problem. I tried repairing MS word and also running the diagnostics countless times… thanks!
Oh, thank you so much. I already installed, re-installed, repaired… and was about to just *sigh* buy the 2010 edition, but your fix immediately helped ^_^
Thank you so much…after endless frustration of crashing word 2007 and trying to edit using Skydrive then download back to my PC, this fix seems to have worked -youa re a legend!
Hey, I got into the registry and found Office\12.0\Word\… but no data folder? Instead there are folders they say Options, Security, and Wizards. Am I doing something wrong? How else can I find this folder?
Thank you!
Hey Joelpher
If you’re using Office 2010, the file is under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Word\Data
I haven’t had a chance to test Office 2010 as this problem hasn’t occurred with Office 2010/Windows 7. If you do try this, please ensure that you take a backup :)
Cheers, Ruth
Hi Ruth,
I use Microsoft Works Word Processor. Version 8.0
OS is XP
In my registry, I have no folder called Data
I’ve been using this for years, but lately every single time I exit the program, I receive the crash error message.
Microsoft Works 8 has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience.
Any ideas what I can do to fix this?
Thanks,
Gary
Thanks!! First, I tried Microsoft diagnostics. It crashed. Then I found this posting. It worked.
Thanks again.
Thank You!!!
Thank you so much for this! It started this a lil while back and it finally annoyed me enough to actually do something. This worked perfectly and it has not had any problems since!
Thank you so much! Not only did this fix my crash when closing issue, but also my crash when saving issue. You did indeed save me tons of time and you were far more helpful than microsoft with the problem
No worries Alison, Evans, Georgia and Ben. Glad it helped!
Fabulous Ruth!! …it worked in seconds.. Thanks**
Oh, thank you so much! This worked pefectly!!!
Thank you for helping me to look like I know what I’m doing. This has resolved the issue for at least 4 of our users.
u are fucking good!!! u should work for microsoft !!! hahahahahaha
tnks a lot for saving my day !!!
Leave a Comment