Word 2016 and Excel 2016 - Customize the File > Open menu

Anonymous
2015-09-28T09:13:42+00:00

Hello,

How can I customize the File > Open menu in Word 2016 and Excel 2016, please?

Add a Place works only for the cloud.

As for This PC, it shows me a list of folders I am not interested in, and that apparently I cannot remove.

On the contrary, I'd like to add different folders, which are not even in the C drive but on a D drive.

The only customization I found is in Options > Advanced > File Locations, in there I changed the location for Documents to my D drive, but it does not affect the File > Open menu at all.

And in Excel 2016, this command is not even there under Options.

Thanks and regards,

Marco

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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Suzanne S Barnhill 279.2K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
2015-09-28T13:49:12+00:00

You can bypass this entirely by checking the box for "Don't show the Backstage when opening or saving files" at File | Options | Save. You can then use Ctrl+O or an Open button on the Quick Access Toolbar to go directly to the classic Open dialog, which is an Explorer window in which you can add Favorites to the Navigation pane. When you start Word, the Open dialog will default to the folder you have specified as the default location for your documents; if you open a file from a subfolder, it will become the default for the next open operation.

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Jay Freedman 208.2K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2017-06-13T19:32:24+00:00

When you "add Favorites to the Navigation pane" (renamed as Quick Access in Windows 10) and pin them there, they show up in the Open and Save dialogs of Office programs. That is equivalent to pinning them on the File > Open page of the Backstage, the thing that has been (unfortunately) removed. That's one of the reasons to avoid the Backstage as Suzanne suggested.

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  1. Anonymous
    2017-11-16T15:49:23+00:00

    Thanks

    I was getting crazy with this ... "Open" Page.

    You might wish to add this entry under "How do I get rid of the Open Page ?"

    How do I do to just type three letters "abc" of a file name forexempleabcmyfile.xls, like in the past, and not

    "* abc* like now in Excel 2016 ?

    Thanks in advance.

    Any clue how I could get my old menus back without the useless ribbon ?

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  2. Anonymous
    2017-10-26T15:08:11+00:00

    I was looking for the answer to this question and was surprised that there are few solutions  offered on an internet search. This is the solution I came up with after a few minutes of playing with it.

    To get Excel 2016 to default to the local Save location:

    1. go to the File Tab and select Options
    2. Select "Save" in the pop-up properties window
    3. Place a check next to "Save To Computer by Default"
    4. Make sure you have a default local file location set as you see approriate.

    This settings also works with Word to 2016.

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  3. Anonymous
    2017-10-08T12:48:06+00:00

    This worked for Word 2013 but not for Excel.  Any ideas?  It keeps showing me OneDrive as an option even though I uninstalled OneDrive.  I'd like it to either default to My Documents like Word does when unchecking "show backstop" or be able to remove OneDrive as a choice to open from.

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