AutoRecover is a feature in Microsoft Word 2016 or 2013 that automatically saves the document you’re working on at certain intervals. This allows you to recover the document if your PC malfunctions in the middle of your work. AutoRecover can be enabled or disabled by using the following steps.
- Open Word and select “File” > “Options“.
- Choose “Save” on the left pane.
- Uncheck the box for “Save AutoRecover information every x minutes” if you wish to disable the AutoRecover feature. Check the box to enable it. You can also set the length of time in between when Word saves AutoRecover data.
Gordon says
When I open Word it opens documents I’ve been working on, including one that keeps crashing Word (it contains a dictionary definition uploaded from the internet.)
When I open Word, how do I disable Word’s automatic opening of files that were open when it crashed before, since one of these files keeps crashing Word again?
Obviously, I can’t reopen Word to disable anything, so this has to be done from outside Word.
Anthony Pipes says
To those commenting that it doesn’t work… I think this is a different feature to what you are wanting. Mine does autosave but wanted to turn it off as for me it doesn’t benefit me. Took me a lot of finding but:
In your document go to ‘File’, then ‘Options’ as above. Then go into ‘Advanced’. Scroll down to the ‘Save’ menu and you get four tickbox options, the bottom one being ‘Allow background saves’. If you check that, it should work. Well, I unchecked it and it has greyed out my autosave on the toolbar.
Karlene Reith says
autosave is greyed out in the toolbar even though it is supposedly “on” in the settings
Kim Astrom says
Same problem, autosave on the top toolbar is greyed out and off, although autosave has been enabled under options.
Ron says
Does not work for me. The autosave on my top toolbar is greyed out in Excel.