MS Office files opening with 2010 Word/Excel, not 2016 versions

Question

I have Office 2010 and 2016 installed on a Windows 10 computer.

Until recently the Word files have been correctly opening with 2016 by default. My Word stopped printing for some reason, so I did "Repair" on Office 2016 via the Programs menu and restarted the computer. Since then, it's opening all the files in 2010, not 2016. (This includes both .doc* and .xls* files).

I've gone to the Default Programs, and told it to open Word files with C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\root\Office16\WINWORD.EXE, but they're still opening in 2010.

I also tried setting Word 2016 as default with the Control Panel --> Default Programs feature...both via the "Associate a File Type with a Specific Program", and "Set your default programs" methods, to no avail.

I've also right clicked the actual word document, went to Properties, and chose the above mentioned path for the "Opens With" property. ...still opens in 2010.

How can I reset the system to open my Office (both Word and Excel are opening in 2010) files in 2016 version, not 2010?

Solution

As pointed by @DavidPostill in the comments, repairing the office installation fixes the problem.

Go to Control Panel - Programs - Programs and Features Right click the Microsoft Office 2016 icon and select Change, then Quick Repair.

That did it for me.

Comments

[DavidPostill]

Did you try Repair an Office application?

[BruceWayne]

@DavidPostill yeah I did. Well...hmm. I was using word, all was working well (2016 was default program) but it stopped being able to print. So I did the repair, as you linked to, and then did the default switch to 2010...ha, didn't occur to re-repair. I'll do so in the morning and report back.

[BruceWayne]

@DavidPostill - hangs head in shame - Repairing Office (again) did the trick! I don't know why I didn't think to do that before posting here, I know better! Thanks a lot for nudging me on this one, I appreciate it! :D

[DavidPostill]

No problem - good that you fixed it ;)

[Rowan Hawkins]

@DavidPostill or BruceWane : Someone should put in an "answer" so that this question can be marked as answered. That way someone with a similar issue will see that there is an answer here, even if you answered your own question.

[aaa]

@DavidPostill. Hi, I'm having the same issue but I'm using working computer. I do not have the permission to uninstall programs. Is there any alternative I can look into? I'm having Excel 2010 & Excel 2016 installed, I'm opening Excel files using VBS, I set the default to Excel 2016 but it is opening in Excel 2010. The macro does not work in Excel 2010. I tried CreateObject("Excel.Application.16"), but the file is still being open by Excel 2010.

[Taylor Alex Raine]

It is worth noting that this solution may require you to restart your computer