Document Recovery ( AutoRecover ) is not working for Excel 2016. System: Windows 8.1 64 bit Microsoft Excel 2016 MSO (16.0.8528.2126) 64 bit No fix even after a full Online repair of Office 2016 and, of course, all possible Office Updates. After working for hours on several Excel documents (which had previously been saved with a file name etc.), the power went out in our building. When the power was restored and Excel reopened, I was presented with the expected list of Recovered Documents on the left side. HOWEVER, every single one of these were simply "the Original version" or "the version last saved by user" (something like that). Meaning they did not contain ANY new data that had been entered since the last time I had saved them/reopened them despite the AutoRecover being set to 1 minute. NOTES : Document Recovery seems to be working for Word and PP. The settings in Options>Save are all the same for all Office products: currently set to AutoRecover every 1 minute. The ...AppData>Roaming>Microsoft>Excel folder contains no backup file/folder for new or reopened Excel Documents. Thank goodness, the AutoRecover does seem to be updating the equivalent folder for Word ("AutoRecovery save of DocumentX.asd" files get updated) and PowerPoint (the "pptXXX.tmp" file also updated). Edit: This is obviously some MSOffice Bug. Of the multiple 'test' spreadsheets I've been playing around with to study this, exactly 1 of them seems to actually back up. But absolutely no other ones and none of my previously created sheets ever backup to AutoRecover.

Noticed AutoRecover issues starting with whatever release the AutoSave On/Off switch was added. This seems to be for AutoSave on OneDrive only. It's always been dimmed out for me, even though I have OneDrive activated under my Microsoft account. I'm not clear how it's activated, but I don't want to use OneDrive for backup anyway. I want to do it locally. Last week after a clean Windows 10 reinstall and Office download, I have Excel 1801 (Build 9001.2171). Again, same issue as the OP and lost a night's worth of work. This is what the Save options showed: How Disabl e AutoRecover for this workbook only ever got checked on the file, or when, I have no idea. The affected file is four months old. This selection does not appear to happen on new files. If kept, it should be moved to right above or below AutoRecover file location . But it's not something I'd ever pick and has probably caused much untold misery. Uncheck it, and I do get AutoRecovery file action in the folder. Whether AutoRecovery will actually work after a premature shutdown remains to be seen.

I went back to Excel 2010 this morning. I lost a days work and found that disable autorecover is a default and I cant seem to change it. It always reverts back to disabled. I work in areas without internet access sometimes, so not being able to autosave to my C:\ drive is a deal breaker. I work for a fire department in our wildland fire division...sort of by definition I am out in the woods if the taxpayers are getting their monies worth for me. I understand Microsoft wants to force people onto Onedrive and off of Dropbox and such. But this seems draconian. I wonder how long I can stay on Windows 7 and Office 2010? Microsoft did refund my Office 365 payment with no problem. They were understanding about why I had to cancel. Strange business strategy....

It has been over 4 months and this issue is not resolved! I keep loosing work that is supposed to be AutoRecovered! I have it set to every 1 min! I also had found that the Disable AutoRecover was checked about a month ago. Why would that even be an option! I am also noting that there is one file in the recommended spot, but it is a binary file, not what I told Excel to use. But, never the less, the file is not updating every minute! I lost 2 hours of work this morning and have been researching this issue ever since. And on a separate note, the AutoSave (only to MS cloud spaces) is completely Effed up! Let me AutoSave wherever I want!

I am experiencing the same issue in Excel 2016 in Windows 10 (Autorecovery is set to 10 min, no exceptions) . I've just lost 2 weeks of important work.

Excel 2016 AutoRecover not working - NO files being saved to the AutoRecover File location

Anonymous

Document Recovery (AutoRecover) is not working for Excel 2016.

System:

Windows 8.1 64 bit

Microsoft Excel 2016 MSO (16.0.8528.2126) 64 bit

No fix even after a full Online repair of Office 2016 and, of course, all possible Office Updates.

After working for hours on several Excel documents (which had previously been saved with a file name etc.), the power went out in our building. When the power was restored and Excel reopened, I was presented with the expected list of Recovered Documents on the left side. HOWEVER, every single one of these were simply "the Original version" or "the version last saved by user" (something like that).

Meaning they did not contain ANY new data that had been entered since the last time I had saved them/reopened them despite the AutoRecover being set to 1 minute.

NOTES:

Document Recovery seems to be working for Word and PP.
The settings in Options>Save are all the same for all Office products: currently set to AutoRecover every 1 minute.
The ...AppData>Roaming>Microsoft>Excel folder contains no backup file/folder for new or reopened Excel Documents. Thank goodness, the AutoRecover does seem to be updating the equivalent folder for Word ("AutoRecovery save of DocumentX.asd" files get updated) and PowerPoint (the "pptXXX.tmp" file also updated).

Edit: This is obviously some MSOffice Bug. Of the multiple 'test' spreadsheets I've been playing around with to study this, exactly 1 of them seems to actually back up. But absolutely no other ones and none of my previously created sheets ever backup to AutoRecover.

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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Anonymous

I finally found the right location of the autorecovery files for Mac users of Excel!

See: this post on this forum

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94 additional answers

Anonymous

2018-02-26T05:57:51+00:00

Noticed AutoRecover issues starting with whatever release the AutoSave On/Off switch was added. This seems to be for AutoSave on OneDrive only. It's always been dimmed out for me, even though I have OneDrive activated under my Microsoft account.

I'm not clear how it's activated, but I don't want to use OneDrive for backup anyway. I want to do it locally.

Last week after a clean Windows 10 reinstall and Office download, I have Excel 1801 (Build 9001.2171). Again, same issue as the OP and lost a night's worth of work. This is what the Save options showed:

How Disabl e AutoRecover for this workbook only ever got checked on the file, or when, I have no idea. The affected file is four months old. This selection does not appear to happen on new files. If kept, it should be moved to right above or below AutoRecover file location. But it's not something I'd ever pick and has probably caused much untold misery.

Uncheck it, and I do get AutoRecovery file action in the folder. Whether AutoRecovery will actually work after a premature shutdown remains to be seen.
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Anonymous

2018-02-13T17:13:49+00:00

I went back to Excel 2010 this morning. I lost a days work and found that disable autorecover is a default and I cant seem to change it. It always reverts back to disabled. I work in areas without internet access sometimes, so not being able to autosave to my C:\ drive is a deal breaker. I work for a fire department in our wildland fire division...sort of by definition I am out in the woods if the taxpayers are getting their monies worth for me.

I understand Microsoft wants to force people onto Onedrive and off of Dropbox and such. But this seems draconian. I wonder how long I can stay on Windows 7 and Office 2010?

Microsoft did refund my Office 365 payment with no problem. They were understanding about why I had to cancel. Strange business strategy....
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Anonymous

2018-02-08T20:25:43+00:00

It has been over 4 months and this issue is not resolved!

I keep loosing work that is supposed to be AutoRecovered! I have it set to every 1 min! I also had found that the Disable AutoRecover was checked about a month ago. Why would that even be an option!

I am also noting that there is one file in the recommended spot, but it is a binary file, not what I told Excel to use. But, never the less, the file is not updating every minute!

I lost 2 hours of work this morning and have been researching this issue ever since.

And on a separate note, the AutoSave (only to MS cloud spaces) is completely Effed up! Let me AutoSave wherever I want!
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Anonymous

2018-01-31T21:02:18+00:00

I am experiencing the same issue in Excel 2016 in Windows 10 (Autorecovery is set to 10 min, no exceptions) . I've just lost 2 weeks of important work.
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