How to recover data from a damaged hard drive on a Mac?

Generally, you can use third-party data recovery tools to recover data, such as Aiseesoft Data Recovery for Mac. But if your hard drive has suffered physical damage, you can only ask the data recovery center for help.

Is it possible to recover a corrupted Mac hard drive?

Yes, it is. You can use some hard drive recovery software for Mac to recover them effectively. The procedure always takes a few minutes.

How do I back up my hard drive on my Mac?

Select System Settings from the Apple menu. Select General from the sidebar, and then select Time Machine on the right. Click the Add button (+) or Add Backup Disk . Choose the device you want to recover and click Set Up Disk .

How to Recover Unsaved Word Documents on Mac with 6 Ways

February 06, 2025Andrew Miller

Recover Mac Data

You may feel hard to get lost Word document back, especially unsaved Word file on Mac. This post shows 5 best solutions to ensure you easily recover unsaved Word document 2019/2016/2017/2013/2011/2015 from Mac.

Don't you have a habit of saving your Word document every now and then while editing? Get a Word document that accidentally closed without saving? You are more likely to lose some new content due to various reasons. All operations after the previous saved state are gone. What should you do?

Microsoft Word document content loss on Mac may easily occur. You won't care about it until one day you lose one important file. You edit and do lots of work on a Word document and forget to save it. You prefer to directly recover an unsaved Word file rather than write it again, and you come here to look for a way. Then you hit the right place; the following parts will show you how to recover unsaved Word documents on a Mac.

Part 1. Recover Unsaved Word Document on Mac [High Success Rate]
Part 2. How to Recover Word Document that Was Not Saved on Mac from Trash
Part 3. How to Find Unsaved Word Documents on Mac via Terminal
Part 4. How to Recover Unsaved Word Document on Mac with AutoRecovery
Part 5. How to Recover Replaced Word Document on Mac with Time Machine
Part 6. Tips for Unsaved Word Document Recovery on Mac

Part 1. Recover Unsaved Word Document on Mac [High Success Rate]

In fact, Mac data recovering software can be the best option to recover deleted/lost files, including unsaved Word document on Mac. In case you have tried all methods you knew and fail to get lost data back, here at the first part, we sincerely recommend the professional Mac Data Recovery to help you recover unsaved Word 2019/2016/2017/2011/2013 document on Mac.

Downloads

Aiseesoft Mac Data Recovery

Recover unsaved/deleted/lost Word docs from Mac, memory cards, USB drives, flash drives, cameras, etc.
Support all Word versions, including Word 2000/2003/2007/2010/2019, Office 365, etc.
Support recovering other file types such as photos, videos, audio, emails, documents, and other files.
Handle various data loss situations like deleted, drive formatted, RAW hard drive, crashed computer, etc.

Step 1.

Launch Mac Data Recovery

Double click the download button above to free download, install and run this powerful Mac data recovering software on your Mac. Make sure you download the right version. When you enter its main interface, choose the "Mac Data Recovery" feature.

Step 2.

Scan unsaved Word file(s)

This all-featured data recovery software enables you to recover many frequently-used data types like photos, audio, videos, emails, documents and more. If all your need is to recover unsaved Word document, here you can only choose Document. It will quick the scanning speed.

Click "Scan" to start a quick scan on your Mac. It also offer a Deep Scan feature in case you can't find the deleted or lost data.

Step 3.

Recover unsaved Word document on Mac

After scanning, you can see all your files from the results. You can click specific data type on the left pane. You can quickly find the unsaved Word file through filter feature, data type or path list.

You are allowed to view each file by double clicking on it. Select files you want to restore and then click the "Recover" to recover your unsaved Word documents on Mac.

Part 2. How to Recover Word Document that Was Not Saved on Mac from Trash

Many reasons will cause your unsaved Word document gone. Go without saying that, when you lose some data on Mac, Trash will definitely be an important place where you want to get them back. So first, you can open Trash folder to look for your missing Word file.

You can double click Trash icon in the dock to open Trash folder. You can see many contents of the trash. When you find the Word file, you can right click on it and choose "Put Back" to recover unsaved Word document on Mac. Read more about how to recover Trash on Mac.

Step 1.

Open the “Trash” folder on the Mac screen.

Step 2.

Right-click on the file you deleted and choose “Put Back”.

Now, you will find your lost file is in its original region.

However, if you clear your Trash folder accidentally, I recommend the way above, which is easier and offers a high success rate of getting your important Word doc back.

Part 3. How to Find Unsaved Word Documents on Mac via Terminal

To recover unsaved Word document on Mac, you can rely on the Temporary folder. Mac Temporary folder may keep some files temporarily. Most users don't know this method because this folder is hard to find. You can check the path below to look for your lost document.

Step 1.

First, you need to locate "Terminal". You can open "Applications" and then choose "Utilities" to find "Terminal".

Step 2.

Open "Terminal" > "$TMPDIR" and then press "Enter" on your keyboard to enter the Terminal folder. Here you can check "Temporaryitems" folder to try finding your unsaved Word document, and also the temp Excel file.

Recover Unsaved Word Document from Temporary

Part 4. How to Recover Unsaved Word Document on Mac with AutoRecovery

You should know that, the powerful Word software is equipped with a built-in auto save feature, for both Mac version and Windows version, called AutoRecovery. It has the capability to automatically save the document you are working on. You can restore Word document through this function. This method works for Word 2019, Word 2016, Word 2017, Word 2013, Word 2011, and Word 2015.

Step 1.

Open "Finder" and then click "Go" > "Go to Folder" option on your Mac.

Step 2.

You can directly search for and go to AutoRecovery folder. So you can paste direct path like "~/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Word/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery" to get there.

Step 3.

You will see several or many files with "AutoRecovery save of" when you enter the AutoRecovery folder. Locate the one you want to recover and then change its file extension to Word ".doc".

Recover Word Document with Auto Recovery

Step 4.

Open it to check if it is the unsaved Word document you want to recover. You can click "File" > "Save As" to change a new name. Then click the "Save" button to confirm the operation of recovering unsaved Word document.

Note: The unsaved Word file need to initially be saved with a name on your Mac. Or you can't use this method to find and recover unsaved Word document.

Part 5. How to Recover Replaced Word Document on Mac with Time Machine

Time Machine provides a simple way to back up data on your Mac. Same time, you can rely on it to restore all types of files on Mac. Time Machine is able to make a copy of everything on your Mac. But we have to admit that, for unsaved Word document, you have little hope to get it back from Time Machine backup. But if you want to restore some deleted/lost Word files from Time Machine, it will turn be a good solution.

Step 1.

Connect the device that stores the backup files created by Time Machine to your Mac.

Step 2.

Locate the folder where you previously stored your lost Word doc.

Step 3.

Click the Time Machine icon on the menu bar.

Step 4.

According to the timeline, locate the Word doc you want to find back.

Step 5.

Click the Continue button to restore. Then, the document will be restored to its original location.

Part 6. Tips for Unsaved Word Document Recovery on Mac

Without a doubt, it is vexing to find your Word doc unsaved, and if you haven’t a backup, it might be hard to retrieve the lost doc. So, we recommend some tips here to avoid losing your Word doc.

Enable AutoSave Feature

Using Microsoft Word’s built-in AutoRecovery Feature can save your work at regular intervals, effectively avoiding a Word doc loss. To enable Auto Save feature, you can follow the steps below:

Step 1.

Open the Word document, click “File” > “Options” > “Save”.

Step 2.

Check the box “Save AutoRecover information every x minutes.” You can adjust the x value to set the intervals. The shorter the x value, the more frequent your Word autosaves.

Step 3.

Click “OK” to apply your modification.

Regularly Save Your Work Manually

While AutoSave is helpful, it’s essential to develop the habit of saving your document manually. Using keyboard shortcuts like “Command + S” frequently to save your progress can be convenient and save more trouble.

Utilize Cloud Storage Solutions

Storing your documents in cloud services like OneDrive, Google Drive, or Dropbox provides an additional layer of security. These services often have their own version history and recovery options. They allow you to access your documents from any device with internet access. Ensure you regularly sync your files with the cloud service for real-time backups.

Conclusion

We have shared 6 effective ways on how to recover unsaved Word documents on Mac. I hope you can easily find your Word file after reading the page. And to avoid such Word doc loss, you can follow the tips to enable the AutoSave feature, or just develop a habit of manual saving. If you still have any questions or need a better solution, you can tell us in the comments.

What do you think of this post?