If everything is working as it should then it's quite hard to lose a file in Word. Word has an autosave feature means that in the event of an accident you should still have the bulk of your work, except for the last ten minutes. We explain how to recover a Word Document from autosave below , including where does Word autosave on a Mac.
So don't panic! There is a good chance that you can get your document back. We'll run through the various ways you can recover an unsaved or deleted Word document below. You may also find one of these articles helpful: How to recover lost TextEdit documents or How to recover deleted files. In some cases, your file might be missing because you deleted it. It's easily done when you are trying to make room on your Mac and you remove a load of old files only to realise that one of them was crucial. Luckily this isn't as disastrous as it sounds. The document might still be found in the Trash.
It would be lovely if everything was that simple, but chances are that you didn't find your file that easily. Don't give up hope! Word for Mac has a built-in autosave feature called AutoRecover which is switched on by default.
How To… Recover Word & Excel Files After A Mac Crash
This means that Word is quietly saving the document you are working on without you needing to manually tell the software to do so. For this feature to function properly you'll need to initially save the document with a name, then Word will make incremental saves every ten minutes.
However, if the document was lost because your computer or software shut down unexpectedly then you should be prompted with a recovered file when you relaunch Word, even if you hadn't saved it yet. In that case you still might be able to find a version of it in the AutoRecovery folder. The way this works depends on the version of Word for Mac you are using. We'll look at each separately below. Want to get to know Word better? Read our Top tips for Word for Mac. Even if you don't find your document in the AutoRecovery folder, it may not be the case that it isn't there.
Files in the AutoRecover folder don't always show up. We have first-hand experience of this. This would not be an issue, except for the fact that when we then accessed the folder just a quick search in Spotlight for Office AutoRecovery the files were nowhere to be seen. As you can see from this screen grab, the most recent file in our AutoRecovery folder was from 5 March, but we know that there are more recent files saved there. The problem with the AutoRecovery file is that it is located in a Library folder that isn't visible by default, and that will have some impact on whether your files are visible or not.
Did you know that Word could be making backup of your documents? Todo Backup Advanced Server. Program crash or sudden Mac shutting down can cause the unsaved or saved Excel files loss. When the accident happens, do not worry. If the Excel files already gone are unsaved, you can use the two solutions in Part 1 to recover them in large part. While if you have mistakenly permanently deleted the Excel files or the saved documents are disappeared caused by other reasons, there is no way but use professional and free data recovery software - EaseUS Data Recovery for Mac recommended in Part 2 to get them back.
Read on and see the details. Then you have to follow the instruction to close the program and lose the unsaved file you have been working on for a few hours unsurprisingly. And the unexpected Mac shutting down can also bring the same result. Whatever led the accident, you have a chance to recover Excel file not saved on Mac.
Part 2. How to Restore Deleted/Lost Excel File on Mac in 3 Steps
Select the folder named "TemporaryItems". Because the AutoRecovery file has been hidden, you need to make it visible to recover unsaved Excel file. Type defaults write com. You may get the unsaved Excel file back with the above two approaches. But you can't use them to recover lost Excel file from due to accidental deletion, hard drive formatting, system crash, or storage device corruption.
Then, what to do at this kind of circumstances? Don't worry.
How to Recover Saved and Unsaved Office Files for Mac
As a leading data recovery tool, it allows you to do Office document recovery, email recovery , photos recovery, as well as other data recovery. Step 1. Select the location where your important Excel files were lost and click Scan button. Step 2. EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard for Mac will start immediately a quick scan as well as a deep scan on your selected disk volume. Meanwhile, the scanning results will be presented in the left pane.
Step 3. By Path and Type, you can quickly filter the Excel files you've lost earlier. Select the target files and click Recover Now button to get them back at once.