[Tip] Customize Number of Recent Documents and Show Them in Left Sidebar of Microsoft Office Programs

If you use Microsoft Office suite in your computer, you might be aware of the fact that Microsoft has replaced the old Menubar with the new Ribbon UI in Office 2007, 2010 and the latest 2013 versions. The new Ribbon UI shows a FILE menu in top-left corner of all Office program windows which allows you to access various options such as create new documents, open existing documents, save your documents, open settings, etc.

When you click on FILE menu, it shows a interface having 2 panes in it. Left-side pane shows various tabs such as New, Open, Save, Close, Options, etc and the right-side pane shows the content of these tabs. It also shows a list of recently opened documents.

Today in this tutorial, we’ll tell you a way to customize number of recent documents which are shown in Office programs. Also we’ll tell you about a useful feature of Office suite which allows you to show recent documents list in left-sidebar so that you can access them quickly and easily.

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So without wasting time lets start the tutorial:

1. Open any desired Office program such as Microsoft Word and click on FILE menu. Now click on Options tab and it’ll open Options window.

2. Go to Advanced tab and in right-side pane scroll down a little to access “Display” section.

3. Here you’ll see following 2 options:

  • Show this number of recent documents
  • Quickly access this number of recent documents

Quickly_Access_Recent_Documents_in_Office_2013.png

The first option “Show this number of recent documents” allows you to change the number of recent documents which are shown in right-side pane of FILE menu. You can customize the number according to your requirements. If you want to disable or hide recent documents list, simply set the number to 0.

Second option “Quickly access this number of recent documents” is a useful feature of Office suite which is not enabled by default. It allows you to show recent documents list in left-sidebar of FILE menu. It helps you in accessing your recently opened documents quickly.

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To show recent documents list in left-side pane, simply enable the option and set the number according to your requirements. It’ll immediately start showing them in left-sidebar as shown in following image:

Recent_Documents_History_in_Office_2013_File_Menu.png

You’ll need to enable this option separately in all Office programs such as Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, etc.

As you can see its quite handy feature of Microsoft Office suite which is generally overlooked by Office users. Did you know about this feature?

Published in: Microsoft Office

About the author: Vishal Gupta (also known as VG) has been awarded with Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) award. He holds Masters degree in Computer Applications (MCA). He has written several tech articles for popular newspapers and magazines and has also appeared in tech shows on various TV channels.

Comments

NOTE: Older comments have been removed to reduce database overhead.

  1. VG, in Office 2007 SP2 there is no option “Quickly access this number of recent documents”. Is it only for Office 2010 or 2013? Thanks before.

  2. ^^ I have not checked with Office 2007 but it’ll not work in Office 2007 because it doesnt show that left-sidebar upon clicking on the ORB. It shows a menubar similar to Windows 8 Explorer ribbon.

  3. @VG and delta,

    comfirmed. it doesn’t work, generally. But it does shows a similar option on the Advanced menu > Display. I wonder if you guys were referring to “Show this number of recent documents”?

  4. I want to DISABLE “Quickly access this number of Recent Documents” in the left sidebar but the Display section under my Advanced options does not show that check box as shown above. Is there another way to do this?

  5. Hi man,

    i was wondering, how to do it, with GPO?.. i need to hide the recent documents for all users that open the application from a server. Thnx

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