Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, and Word in Microsoft 365. If you are using an earlier version (Word 2003 or earlier), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for earlier versions of Word, click here: Rechecking Spelling and Grammar.

Rechecking Spelling and Grammar

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated March 11, 2023)
This tip applies to Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, and Word in Microsoft 365


3

When you check the spelling and grammar of your document, Word keeps track of which errors you choose to ignore. Even if you later go through a grammar and spell check again, Word still remembers your earlier decisions, and it can affect the current check you are doing.

At some point you may want to toss out your earlier decisions and recheck the document from scratch. You can do so by following these steps:

  1. Display the Word Options dialog box. (In Word 2007 click the Office button and then click Word Options. In Word 2010 and later versions display the File tab of the ribbon and then click Options.)
  2. At the left side of the dialog box click Proofing. (See Figure 1.)
  3. Figure 1. The proofing options of the Word Options dialog box.

  4. Click Check Document (Word 2007) or Recheck Document (Word 2010 and later versions). You'll see a dialog box asking if you really want to recheck everything.
  5. Click on Yes.
  6. Click on OK to close the Word Options dialog box.

At this point it may not look like anything has changed in your document. However, if you do a grammar and spell check (press F7) you will find that Word once again questions everything it thinks is wrong in your document.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (6274) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, and Word in Microsoft 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Word here: Rechecking Spelling and Grammar.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Entering or Importing Times without Colons

Enter a time into a cell and you normally include a colon between the hours and minutes. If you want to skip that pesky ...

Discover More

Setting a Default Workbook Window Size and Zoom Level

In order to make working with a workbook comfortable, you often need to set both a window size and a zoom level for the ...

Discover More

Non-standard Sorting

Information in a cell can be entered using line feeds, which results in multiple lines of data in the same cell. If you ...

Discover More

Do More in Less Time! An easy-to-understand guide to the more advanced features available in the Microsoft 365 version of Word. Enhance the quality of your documents and boost productivity in any field with this in-depth resource. Complete your Word-related tasks more efficiently as you unlock lesser-known tools and learn to quickly access the features you need. Check out Microsoft 365 Word For Professionals For Dummies today!

More WordTips (ribbon)

Expanding a Custom Dictionary

Does Word tell you that your custom dictionary is full? It might not actually be full, but even if it is, you can add ...

Discover More

Turning Off the Check for Repeated Words

If your work involves the usage of repeated words, you may be interested in configuring Word so it doesn't flag those ...

Discover More

Setting Spell-Checking Options

Like many things in Word, you can configure the way the spelling checker does its job. If you want to exercise more ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is two minus 0?

2023-05-18 04:36:13

Bill

I have the opposite problem with Word 365. I run the spell checker and grammar checker and make decisions to ignore some of the errors. When the process is finished and no more errors are found (and I get no errors if I run them again), I save the document. If I re-open the document and try running the spell checker and grammar checker again, it flags many of the errors I had previously made decisions about during the first run. This is very annoying, since I can't get the document to appear clean without turning off checking completely (which I don't want to do).

Why is Word not honoring the decisions I made about ignoring the 'errors' it thinks it found?


2023-03-11 10:35:49

Elizabeth Mercado

This tip is very helpful to me, thanks for posting!


2023-03-11 10:00:49

Dave Dyer

Would you reprint a macro(s) for use in Outlook.com that i could use for repetitive replies for Office 2019 please?


This Site

Got a version of Word that uses the ribbon interface (Word 2007 or later)? This site is for you! If you use an earlier version of Word, visit our WordTips site focusing on the menu interface.

Videos
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.