Pankil is a Civil Engineer turned freelance writer. Since his arrival at Guiding Tech in 2021, he delves into the world of how-tos, and troubleshooting guides for Android, iOS, and Windows. Besides his new-found love for mechanical keyboards, he's a disciplined footfall fan and loves international travel with his wife. Learn about our Tech Review Board
Updated August 16, 2024If the issue in question is limited to a select few Word documents, the read-only file attribute may be enabled for those files. Here’s how to fix it.
Step 1: Right-click on the Word file > select Properties.
Step 2: Under the General tab, uncheck the Read-only box in the Attributes section. Then, click Apply > OK.
The Preview pane feature in File Explorer lets you preview your files without opening them. For this to work, File Explorer may set your files to read-only mode. To avoid this, disable the Preview pane feature in File Explorer.
Step 1: Press the Windows key + E to open File Explorer.
Step 2: Click the View menu at the top > go to Show > uncheck Preview pane.
Microsoft Word may open a document in read-only mode if the document owner has imposed editing restrictions. If you have the password for the file, you can easily remove the read-only restriction for that document by following the steps below.
Step 1: Open the password-protected document in Word.
Step 2: On the Review tab, click Restrict Editing in the Protect group.
Step 3: On the Restrict Editing pane on the right, click the Stop Protection button.
Step 4: Enter the password for the file and click OK.
Another reason Word may open your documents in read-only mode is if you’ve previously configured it to open all your email attachments in reading view. Here’s how to change that.
Step 1: Open Microsoft Word and click the File menu at the top left.
Step 2: Select Options from the left pane.
Step 3: In the General tab, scroll to the Start up options section in the right pane. Uncheck Open e-mail attachments and other uneditable files in reading view and hit OK.
Protected View is a security feature in Word that keeps your PC safe from malicious files. When enabled, Word will open any suspicious files in read-only mode. However, if you’re confident about the legitimacy of your Word document, you can temporarily disable the Protected View feature.
Step 1: In the Microsoft Word window, click File > Options.
Step 2: In the Word Options window, switch to the Trust Center tab from the left column and click on Trust Center Settings.
Step 3: By default, all three options in the Protected View tab are checked. To disable Protected View, uncheck all three checkboxes and click OK to save changes.
Microsoft provides a handy repair tool for the Office suite. It can automatically detect and resolve any problems with your Office programs, including Word. You can run this tool as a last resort if Microsoft Word still opens your files in read-only mode.
Step 1: Right-click on the Start icon and select Installed apps from the list.
Step 2: Scroll down to locate the Microsoft Office product on the list. Click the three-dot menu icon next to it > select Modify.
Step 3: Select Online Repair and click Repair.
