Word templates not opening as new documents

Anonymous
2020-11-17T00:37:36+00:00

This happened after a recent Windows update.

I've seen this issue written about and have tried the suggested solutions without luck.  First tried quick repair and then full reinstall of office 365. Also set related registry entries to "new."

All templates are just opening as .dotm instead of .docm or .docx.  Any other troubleshooting steps available?

[Moved from  Word/Windows 10/Microsoft 365 Apps or Office 365 Business]

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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  1. Doug Robbins - MVP - Office Apps and Services 323.6K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2021-05-30T07:32:06+00:00

    The issue appears to be that the files with the dotm extension are not being recognised by your system as Word files.

    Go to Windows>Settings>Apps>Default apps and scroll to the bottom of the screen and click on choose default applications by file type and scroll down to the .dotm file extension and select Word as the Default application.

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  2. Anonymous
    2021-05-30T04:09:58+00:00

    Hi Doug. I replied.

    Is there a file, folder or setting that can be copied from another machine in the same workgroup? Others don't have this problem.

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  3. Anonymous
    2021-05-11T04:53:51+00:00

    Sorry for the delay.

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  4. Doug Robbins - MVP - Office Apps and Services 323.6K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2021-05-02T06:41:20+00:00

    Can you show us a screen shot of the dialog that appears when you right click on a Word Template.

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  5. Anonymous
    2021-05-02T04:32:43+00:00

    No change.

    I ran winword.exe /r

    and

    "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\root\Office16\winword.exe" /r

    Neither resulted in any notification and nothing changed.

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