Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, and 2013. 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: Deleting a Large Number of Styles.
Daniel has a problem that many people may face from time to time. He gets documents from others in his office, and they often contain a large number of styles that he needs to delete. Deleting a large number of styles one at a time is a real pain, so he is looking for a way to delete a large number of styles all at once.
The easiest way to do this is to use a behind-the-scenes tool called the Organizer. Follow these steps:
Figure 1. The Styles tab of the Organizer.
Remember that some built-in styles (such as Normal) cannot be deleted from the list of styles.
WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (9653) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, and 2013. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Word here: Deleting a Large Number of Styles.
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2017-09-29 22:06:32
Ken Endacott
Kyle,
The following macro will delete all custom styles in the document. it uses OrganizerDelete rather than painfully slow sty.Delete
Sub DeleteCustonStyles()
Dim sty As Style
Dim docPath As String
Dim j As Long
Dim k As Long
docPath = ActiveDocument.Path & "\" & ActiveDocument.Name
j = ActiveDocument.Styles.Count
For k = j To 1 Step -1
Set sty = ActiveDocument.Styles(k)
If Not sty.BuiltIn Then
Application.OrganizerDelete Source:=docPath, _
Name:=sty.NameLocal, Object:=wdOrganizerObjectStyles
End If
Next k
MsgBox "All custom styles deleted"
End Sub
2017-09-28 11:05:05
Kylie
Ken,
All I see there is how to delete unused styles. I want to delete all styles, used and unused, except the built in ones. I receive hundreds of documents created by various individuals which all have different styles and I need to get rid of them and just have the built in styles remaining. This would be easy if I just created a macro to delete the styles and then format the document the way I need it formatted (Times New Roman, Size 9, etc.). Help?
2017-09-28 03:08:15
Ken Endacott
Kylie
See:
https://word.tips.net/T001337_Removing_Unused_Styles.html
Note the comments that discuss how to overcome the very slow execution time of the macro given in the tip.
2017-09-27 12:04:16
Kylie
Can this action be simplified into a macro?
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Please Note:
This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, and 2013. 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: 
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