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How to Recover corrupted word files?

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Saturday, July 12, 2014 12:13 PM

Recently I have been digging for old Word (2013) files and I have found that some of them are corrupted. How this happened is a mystery to me, and if someone could comment I would appreciate it.

However, what I am concerned with is recovering some of them. Whereas some I can let go without much issue, others are very important.

I would appreciate any help in recovering them, either with procedures I am yet unfamiliar with, or using specific software. Free would be preferable, but if best-in-class is pay and I need it, I'll buy it. Thanks for your opinions.

All replies (9)

Saturday, July 12, 2014 8:25 PM ✅Answered | 1 vote

It could be Word or even Windows that is having the problem. Before you start trying to restore a backup or repair a file, try opening other documents. Try opening your "corrupt" document from another computer. Also you can try to make a copy of corrupted files. (It could work)

But if nothing helps, you can try to recover it by using Recovery Toolbox for Word.  Download free demo versions of this software from Recovery Toolbox website:  http://www.repairword.recoverytoolbox.com/ It’s gonna help. 

Saturday, July 12, 2014 12:53 PM | 1 vote

Which symptoms are you seeing? Have you tried Open and Repair?

Stefan Blom, Microsoft Word MVP

Sunday, July 13, 2014 3:37 AM | 1 vote

When a Word document file is corrupted, then you can try several methods to recover it:

  1. First of all, you can try the recovery function integrated with Microsoft Word, as follows:
  1. On the File menu, click Open.
  2. In the Look in list, click the drive, folder, or Internet location that contains the file that you want to open.
  3. In the folder list, locate and open the folder that contains the file.
  4. Select the file that you want to recover.
  5. Click the arrow next to the Open button, and then click Open and Repair.

You may find more information about this at:

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word-help/recover-the-text-from-a-damaged-document-HP005189610.aspx (for Word 2003)
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/893672/en-us (for Word 2007/2010/2013)

  1. Third, you may also try OpenOffice to open and repair the corrupted document. OpenOffice is a free and open source software which is compatible with Word document. Sometimes it can open the corrupt document that Word cannot open.

You can get OpenOffice at http://www.openoffice.org/

  1. If 1 and 2 does not work, then you may try third-party tools such as DataNumen Word Repair at

http://www.datanumen.com/word-repair/

It provides a free demo version so that you can try to see if the data you want can be recovered or not.

Good luck!

Thursday, October 9, 2014 11:04 AM

Finding and using the temporary and auto save files

The default auto save time for word documents is 10 minutes. You can control this time in Options under the "Save" tab. The auto save files are placed in one of the following two locations, which is where you should look to recover the data.

  1. "C:\ Documents and Settings\username>\Application Data\Microsoft\Word".
  2. "C:\ Documents and Settings\username>\Local Settings\Temp"

On Windows 7 and Vista, the locations will be

  1. "C:\Users\username>\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Word"
  2. "C:\Users\username>\AppData\Local\Temp"

If you are looking for files used by word, then the following file types should be looked for, where "xxxx" is a number.

  • A word document file will look like ~wrdxxxx.tmp
  • A temp document file will look like ~wrfxxxx.tmp
  • An auto recovery file will look like ~wraxxxx.tmp
  • An auto recovery file that is complete will have the extension of .wbk.

When you have found a file that looks like it might contain data, you may want to open it in notepad instead of trying to get Word to reassemble it. The easiest way to do this is to open Notepad from the start menu then drag and drop the file in to it. The file will then be opened so that you can view the contents. 

If the document was open when the system failed (power failure or crash) then you could try just opening Word again (not the document, just Word itself from the start menu). Word will then try to recover the lost document.

Wednesday, October 15, 2014 9:17 AM

OK the best thing to do in this case is a System Restore. This will revert the computer to a time before the computer was experiencing the problem with your Office programs. Here is how to perform the restore:

Click Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> System Restore.
Click Next on the first window.
Click the box for Show More Restore Points so that all points are displayed.
Pick a restore point from yesterday (or if there is not a restore point from yesterday, just choose an earlier point).
Click Next.
Click Finish and wait for the restore to complete (the system will reboot).

Friday, October 17, 2014 12:49 PM

Apply this guide for Word document recovery

Instructions
New File

1
Open the document that you were working with that you need to recover.

2
Click "File," "Recent" and "Recover Unsaved Documents" located at the bottom right of the dialog box.

3
Select the file you want to recover from the Saved Drafts folder that appears. Click "Open."

4
Click "Save As" in the business bar along the top of the file, and rename the file as desired.

Previously Saved File

5
Open the document that you were working with that you need to recover.

6
Click "File," "Info" and under Versions, click the version "(When I Closed Without Saving)."

7
Click "Restore" in the business bar at the top of the file to update the file to the last saved version of the document.

Thursday, October 11, 2018 12:40 PM

 MS Word recovery software is the best software to recover damage and corrupted word file. MS Word recovery software quickly recover and repair damage and corrupted word file. Link here:

http://www.softmagnat.com/word-recovery.html

Monday, March 2, 2020 12:18 AM

Hi there. this is messed up! So:it/looks/like/you've/got/a/couple/of/respondents/here(HZsL&George)who/are/earning/points/by/coping&pasting without/linking/sourced/article.I/have/read/this/content/elsewhere.

VJLee

Monday, March 2, 2020 12:19 AM

Thank you for this--I've been researching this topic for days now--wrote a killer bit and, in my excitement, accidentally chose to save the wrong split screen file--autosave, etc. options (except not "save backup copy" that will change in about a minute!) are correctly checked, but the thing won't open via word, renaming and opening, word+fix/recover file tab at bottom of open, browse opening with left-click repair file. ...

When trying to open ~WRS***, a "scratch file" (says MS https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/211632/description-of-how-word-creates-temporary-files), I've tried every version of code presented (UNI, MS-DOS, Windows) and still a bunch of illegible characters and, even so, not the full document.

Any suggestions for this advanced an issue would so greatly be appreciated!!!

VJLee