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This article shows you how to compare two Word documents. You might want to compare two Microsoft Word documents side by side for a number of reasons. You might be a teacher looking for a student who copied someone else’s work. You could also be working on a document with other people and trying to figure out what changes they made.
A good way to keep track of changes and updates is to compare two or more documents. It’s also helpful when you don’t want a document to look too much like something someone else wrote. You can also go to the official Microsoft Word support site to know more information.
It’s important to be able to keep track of small changes, whether you’re working on a team or just making several changes to your own work. The Compare tool in Microsoft Word lets you see all the differences between two nearly identical documents.
How to compare two Word documents
- Start Word and open a new blank document.
- In the ribbon menu, click Review.
- Click Compare and then, in the drop-down menu, click Compare again.
- In the Compare Documents dialog box, choose the two documents you want to compare. To do that, click the Folder icon on the left, in the Original document section, and select the Word document. Then do the same with the Folder icon in the Revised document section to select the Word document that has the changes.
- Optionally, you can click More and customize the settings for your file comparison by choosing exactly what kind of changes you want to see. Also make sure that under Show changes in, New document is selected.
- Click OK.
Why compare Word documents?
The comparison feature is important in the document workflow when you need to quickly find symbols, words, sentences, and even whole paragraphs that were left out or added to larger texts. Document comparison is very common in the following areas of knowledge:
- Law and authority. Templates of contracts, agreements, memoranda, and other documents are used a lot in the legal field. Rarely are new contracts made from scratch, so they may look a lot like old ones. Comparison helps employees keep track of every little thing.
- Regulations. Regulatory papers can be changed in small or big ways. This is true for both government guidelines and software usage policies. Officials only need a few seconds to find the differences between two versions when they use the comparison feature.
- Education. Tutors can look at two Word documents side by side to see what students added or took away from their papers and if they caught all of the mistakes in the first version.
This is not a complete list, because there are so many ways to compare documents. Most industries and companies that use electronic document workflow will be able to use this feature.
FAQ
How do I compare two Word documents with tables?
To compare two Word files, open the two files you want to compare. On the Ribbon, click the “Review” tab. Then, in the “Compare” button group, click the “Compare” drop-down button. The “Compare Documents” dialog box will open when you choose “Compare…” from the drop-down menu.
Can you compare two Word documents side by side?
Open both of the files you want to look at side by side. Click View Side by Side in the Window group of the View tab’s Window group. on the View tab, in the Window group. If you don’t see Synchronous Scrolling, click Window on the View tab, then click Synchronous Scrolling.