Can I remove a word from Office’s speller dictionary?
The other day, I was discussing a number of suggestions to improve Office’s spell-checker. A customer was suggesting we should allow users to delete individual items from Word’s spell-checker lexicon. This feature is already available, in fact: if you want to specify a preferred spelling for a word and to exclude a given spelling from the main lexicon used by the Office speller, you need to use an “exclusion dictionary”. Your speller comes with an empty exclusion dictionary and you can add words to it if you want them to be permanently red-squiggled.
You first need to locate your exclusion dictionary, which, if you use Vista and Office 2007, can be found in the following folder:
C:\Users\User Name\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\UProof\
Each language has a specific dictionary whose name starts with “ExcludeDictionary”, followed by the language code (EN for English, FR for French, SP for Spanish, GE for German…), followed by the LCID (locale identification number). The extension is .lex. For instance:
English (US): ExcludeDictionaryEN0409.lex
English (UK): ExcludeDictionaryEN0809.lex
English (Australia) ExcludeDictionaryEN0c09.lex
English (Canada) ExcludeDictionaryEN1009.lex
French: ExcludeDictionaryFR040c.lex
You can open the file with Notepad or WordPad and add a word which you want the speller to flag as misspelled. Save and close the file. You are done!
You can type “exclude dictionary” or “exclusion dictionary” in the Office help to get more information about this feature.
Of course, caution should be exercised when you decide to remove a word from your Office speller. If you decide to remove the word manger because you frequently type program manger instead of program manager, you should not be surprised when your speller flags manger in a sentence like “Jesus was laid in a manger”. This is why we have introduced a contextual speller, which tries to identify words which exist but are misspelled in a given context (see the post I was referring to, in which I showed how Office 2007 flags some erroneous uses of manger in program manger).
To give another example where contextual spelling might be preferred over exclusion, consider the user who had contacted the Word newsgroup to find out how to exclude the word “ahs” from the main speller lexicon. This user kept typing ahs instead of has. The new context-sensitive speller in Office 2007 flags a number of contexts where "ahs" should not be used, however, which should address this user's problem without having to remove the word altogether from the lexicon. You will see a blue squiggly line under "ahs" if you write something like "He ahs never done it before", for instance. But you will not get any flag under "ahs" if you write "we definitely got oohs and ahs all around when we launched this product".
Thierry Fontenelle – Program Manager
Comments
Anonymous
September 10, 2008
PingBack from http://www.easycoded.com/can-i-remove-a-word-from-office%e2%80%99s-speller-dictionary/Anonymous
September 30, 2008
Thanks for pointing out this (I presume new feature) in Word 2007. In my case, the prime word I wanted to add was "continuos", since I am not involved with music. I had entered it as an AutoCorrect entry which fixes it if "I" type it, but does not show it in documents prepared by others. Also, note that the LCID needs to be in hexadecimal (as above), although Word's help lists them as decimal, e.g. English (U.S.) = 1033 decimal = 0409 Hex.Anonymous
October 09, 2008
How do I add a combination of words to the exclusion dictionary? I'd like to add "in order to," but the spell checker isn't catching it.Anonymous
October 09, 2008
Hello Sean, Only individual words can be excluded from the speller dictionary. This being said, we'd be interested in knowing why you would like "in order to" to be flagged by a spell-checker; it is a perfectly legitimate construction in English. Thanks, ThierryAnonymous
October 09, 2008
I work in law. Often courts impose strict word limits on briefs. "To" can almost always replace "in order to." The change only saves two words, but those words add up over pages and pages of writing! Thanks for the quick response. SeanAnonymous
October 09, 2008
Hi Sean, If you wish to use "to" instead of "in order to", I would then advise you to modify your AutoCorrect file: In Word 2007: Office button, Word Options | Proofing | AutoCorrect options. Best, ThierryAnonymous
October 16, 2008
The thing is this just doesn't really do it for me, prefer something a little less... mainstream.Anonymous
October 20, 2008
Interesting, has given me a great idea for a project!Anonymous
October 27, 2008
it has lots of custom words already in it. It does not allow me to open with notepad or wordpad.Anonymous
January 31, 2009
I'd like to get it to stop suggesting cannot of can not. I really only use "cannot" over can't if I intend to draw emphasis, in which case I prefer use the two seperate words "can" and "not."Anonymous
February 21, 2009
J’avais écrit un billet , il y a quelques mois, sur la façon dont on peut enlever un mot du dictionnaireAnonymous
March 02, 2009
The post I wrote a few months ago about how users can remove a word from the main dictionary of theirAnonymous
January 06, 2010
I was trying to use the exclude dictionary in Word XP and it works very well. I cannot make it work with hyphenated words. For instance, I would like "co-operation" to be branded as an error because "cooperation" is our preferred form but it does not flag "co-operation" as a spelling error, even if I add it to the list. Is there any workaround? DanielAnonymous
July 07, 2010
Word in Windows 7 is change for the sake of change. XP is hard to beat for simplicity and ease of use. 7 is button happy and not concise at all. I work in the medical industry and Autocomplete was fantastic - Quick Bits is just not appropriate for small pieces of content. This is supposed to be progress - it's a backward step. Give us some upgrades and take us back to the XP functions!Anonymous
July 16, 2010
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August 08, 2010
I need to remove a word misspelled from a former employee in the dictionary: "informaiton". Any suggestions?Anonymous
September 19, 2010
this apparently does not work in Office 2010 - there is no App/Data folderAnonymous
October 21, 2010
Same question as Katherine Ward's. My dictionary recognizes "numb3r" as a valid spelling.Anonymous
December 09, 2010
Same question as Katherine Ward and Greg Maynard. I use Office 2010 and clicked 'Add to Dictionary' by mistake. It was easy to remove an incorrectly spelled word in Office 2003. Why can't it be done in the latest edition of Office? (See Jeff's comment above.) It seems that Thierry Fontenelle – Program Manager, is no longer responding to these queries. Why not?Anonymous
December 20, 2010
Previous versions of word allowed you to remove words from the local dictionary. I can't find this feature inWord 2007. I have now many mispelt words in the dictionary which I can't correct. Seems to be a retrograde step, perhaps Microsoft rather than charging for upgrading to the latest version, should provide refunds instead.Anonymous
February 03, 2011
I have the same problem. A couple of misspelled words added incorrectly in haste. Looks like no fix for this problem.Anonymous
February 16, 2011
What is the limit of the word that i can put in the excluision file ?Anonymous
March 21, 2011
Спасибо Thierry. Удалил неправильное слово.Anonymous
March 25, 2011
There is a misspelled word in the Word dictionary - "activites" - I found that when I typed this instead of "activities" it didn't correct it. I wonder how many other misspellings are in the dictionary? It seems like there should be an easy way (and I don't have administrator privileges on this stupid machine!) to fix these things. Even if it doesn't require admin privileges, I wish it was easy. (Using xp and word 2007).Anonymous
August 23, 2011
"This feature is already available" GREAT! So why don't you tell us how to do it?Anonymous
August 24, 2011
I suspect all such corrections (and miscorrections) go into Autocorrect?Anonymous
August 25, 2011
Or in Word File tab then Options/Proofing/click on Custom Dictionaries/click on Custom.dic/then Edit Word listAnonymous
September 06, 2011
Thierry gave a really great answer full of useful information to be sure. Only problem is that you didn't really answer the question. In my case I inadvertantly clicked on add to dictionary for a word that was incorrectly spelled. I don;t want to add the mispelled word to the exclusion dictionary I want to delete it from the dictionary. How do I do that?Anonymous
September 06, 2011
Ted - Have you tried following my post immediately preceding yours? It works for me (in Word 2010)Anonymous
September 07, 2011
Mike - THANK YOU! Your info was very useful, the most concise help on here!Anonymous
September 12, 2011
Thanks for the compliment, Christine. I'm no geek, and sometimes it helps to have the simple approach!Anonymous
October 05, 2011
Absolutely useless. All I wanted was some simple instructions on the steps to take to remove a word that had incorrectly been saved to the dictionary. Not a blog!Anonymous
October 11, 2011
MIke, thank you. Found your tip easy to follow and it worked. Could not find another explanation of how to remove a word.Anonymous
November 03, 2011
Hello, gives this Site in German, because my English is very bad?Anonymous
November 04, 2011
How do you delete a word from the dictionary if you have added it and found out later that it was incorrect?Anonymous
November 15, 2011
I have the same problem, bad mispelled word in the dictionnary and now i can't remove it...Anonymous
May 05, 2012
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July 29, 2012
All I wanted was some simple instructions on the steps to take to remove a word that had incorrectly been saved to the dictionary. These comments didn't seem to address the original question at all. How do I get my question answered???Anonymous
October 17, 2012
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January 05, 2013
I agree with Alan...this was useless!Anonymous
January 28, 2013
Hi Everybody The below link will tell you how to do it. It is far less useless than the above. www.groovypost.com/.../remove-add-words-to-office-2010-word-dictionaryAnonymous
June 25, 2013
Wow. So many people complaining that this particular blog post doesn't answer their question and is therefore a pointless post. Egomania.Anonymous
September 17, 2013
This blog post is not about removing user added words. If you arrived on this page in attempt to learn how to remove the words either you or someone else who has used your system has added, then the problem is not with the content of this article, but with your ability to adequately search the internet. Office 2010 Users In Excel (Word,Access,etc.) Click File (top left corner) On the very bottom right of the drop down menu, select Options Select Proofing from the menu list on the left hand side. Click the Custom Dictionaries button in the middle of the screen. Select CUSTOM.DIC (default) - This will most likely be the only .DIC file you have Click on the Edit Word List... button Find the misspelled, user added word Click Delete OK OK OK Office 2007 Users In Excel (Word,Access,etc.) Click Windows Icon (top left corner) On the very bottom right of the drop down menu, select Excel Options (Word Options, Access Options, etc.) Select Proofing from the menu list on the left hand side. Click the Custom Dictionaries button in the middle of the screen. Select CUSTOM.DIC (default) - This will most likely be the only .DIC file you have Click on the Edit Word List... button Find the misspelled, user added word Click Delete OK OK OK Office 2003 Users THIS PROCESS ONLY AVAILABLE IN WORD - Changes should apply to Excel too Click on the Tools menu at the top Select options Select Spelling & Grammar tab Click on the Dictionaries button (alternatively Custom Dictionary button). Select CUSTOM.DIC - This will most likely be the only .DIC file you have Click the Edit or Modify button. Dictionary is opened. Manually change/delete the misspelling. Close the dictionary. OK OKAnonymous
October 20, 2013
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January 15, 2014
Please help. I'm using Word 2010, and in Serbian language there is latinic and cyrilic letters. I have two files, ExcludeDictionarySR0c1a and ExcludeDictionarySR081a. Which is for cirillic and which is for latin letters? Thanks, m.Anonymous
June 26, 2014
How annoying: looks like there is a way to edit the words the custom dictionary, but no way to correct the dictionary that comes with the software. The word "warranty" is misspelled as "warrenty" in the dictionary (the one that Office came with! Not the custom dictionary we created!) and I work in a law office, so everyone keeps misspelling warranty all the time.Anonymous
July 16, 2014
@Telzey - the dictionary that my version of Word came with does not allow "warrenty", so if it were me, I would check to see if there is custom dictionary that is company rather than product specific.Anonymous
March 02, 2015
Essentially useless. Followed directions to add "qword" to Exclusion Dictionary, because it must have been added to the lexicon at some point and I'm not allowed to delete it. The word is still not recognized as misspelled. Why on earth does Help drop me in a Blog post?!?!? I need Help - not discussion!Anonymous
June 03, 2015
Thats excellent...Anonymous
July 01, 2015
Its brilliantAnonymous
July 13, 2015
My favorite part of this is the text in the initial help window (the one that really, really doesn't answer the question... and then you end up here): 5.Optionally, check the spelling and grammar. For more information on where you can find the spelling checker in other Office pgorams, see Check spelling and grammar in a different language. My problem is, like some of the others, that I inadvertently added a misspelled word to the dictionary. I am using a SurfacePro and the %*^@& pen slipped. Now I'm stuck with 'reoughly' (which is roughly what I wanted).