How to Add or Remove Words from the Microsoft Office Word Dictionary?

Over the years, Microsoft Office Word document has played a vital role in our professional lives. Every time you want to create a professional document, you need to open a Microsoft Office Word document. One of the most useful features in Microsoft Word is the autocorrect feature, but sometimes it annoys a bit. For example, when you repeatedly mention words that aren’t a part of Microsoft Word’s dictionary. However, there is a feature in Microsoft Office Word document that allows you to add those words to your personal dictionary, which is not a part of MS Office.

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In this post, we will guide you on how you can add or remove words from the Microsoft Word Dictionary. There are at least three ways through which you can add or remove words from the Microsoft Word Dictionary. These are the following:-

1. Using Word context menu
2. Through DEFAULT.dic dictionary file

How to Add Words from the Microsoft Office Word Dictionary using MS Word context menu?

This is the easiest way to add custom words in the MS Office word dictionary. It would be best if you did the following:-

Open a Microsoft Word document and type the word which you would like to add to the dictionary. If the typed word is not already in the MS dictionary, you’ll see a red line below it. Right-click on the word, and from the context menu, select Add to dictionary.

If Add to dictionary option is greyed out on your PC, you need to enable the Custom Dictionaries option. Perform the following steps to enable the Custom Dictionaries:-

Step 1. Open Microsoft Word and click on the File menu from the ribbon.

Step 2. Click Options.

Step 3. After completing the above steps, the Word Options dialog will open. Here, select the Proofing option from the left side. Then, on the right side of Proofing, click Custom Dictionaries.

Step 4. A new pop-up window Custom Dictionaries opens. Check the checkbox CUSTOM.DIC. Select Dictionary language as All Languages. Finally, click on the OK button to save the changes.

Step 5. Again click on YOUR TEXT button.

After completing the above steps, you can now add your custom words to the Microsoft Office word dictionary.

How to Remove Words from the Microsoft Office Word Dictionary using the MS Word context menu?

Step 1. Open the Microsoft Word document and click on the File menu from the ribbon.

Step 2. Click Options.

Step 3. After completing the above steps, the Word Options dialog will open. Here, select the Proofing option from the left side. On the right side of Proofing, click Custom Dictionaries.

Step 4. A new pop-up window, Custom Dictionaries, will open. Select CUSTOM.DIC and then click the Edit Word List button.

Step 5. A new pop-up window opens. From here, you can add your custom word to the dictionary or remove any custom word from the dictionary.

How to Add or Remove Words from the Microsoft Office Word Dictionary using DEFAULT.dic dictionary file?

Whenever you add or remove custom words, the DEFAULT.dic file gets modified. The same file we can also edit manually to add or remove custom words from MS Office Word. Do the following to achieve the task:-

Step 1. Press Windows logo + R keys combinations to open the Run command box.

Step 2. In the Run box, copy and paste the following path:-

%AppData%\Microsoft\Spelling\en-US

Step 3. Click OK or press Enter from the keyboard. It will open the en-US sub-folder under the Spelling folder.

Note:- If you are working in MS Office Word in another language, go back to the Spelling folder by navigating to this path: %AppData%\Microsoft\Spelling. Now, open the correct language folder.

Step 4. Right-click on default.dic file and select Open with from the drop-down menu.

Step 5. After selecting the “Open with” option, a new dialog will appear—select Notepad from the available options. If Notepad does not appear at the top, click the “More apps” to see the Notepad option.

Step 6. Click OK to open the custom dictionary in a notepad file. You will see the words ‘#LID 1033’ in its first line. Here, you can add more custom words, each per line. If you want to remove a word from the dictionary, then simply delete it from here. Finally, press Ctrl + S keyboard shortcut to save the document.