How to Delete Comments on Microsoft Word

Working with comments in Microsoft Word allows collaborators to provide feedback and suggestions on a document. However, once that feedback has been addressed or is no longer needed, you may want to remove the comments to clean up the document. Deleting comments in Word is easy – here is a step-by-step guide.

Why You Might Want to Delete Comments

Here are some common reasons you may want to delete comments in a Word document:

• The comments are no longer needed – Once you’ve addressed all the feedback a collaborator provided via comments, you likely want to remove them for a clean document.
• To prepare a document for final distribution – If you plan to finalize and distribute a document widely, deleting old comments cleans it up and removes extraneous text.
• To reduce document size – Comments increase file size, so removing them can slim down a large document.
• To remove sensitive information – Comments may contain feedback or data that you don’t want distributed widely. Deleting them removes that sensitive content.

How to Select and Delete All Comments at Once

If you want to remove all comments quickly from a document, you can select and delete them all at once, rather than individually. Here is how:

1. Open the document containing comments in Microsoft Word.
2. Select the Review tab.
3. In the Comments group, click the Delete drop-down menu.
4. Choose Delete All Comments in Document to select all comments at once.
5. A dialog box will appear giving you the option to delete only the text of the comment or the comment text and the comment bubble/mark in the right margin. Choose your preference.
6. Click Yes to confirm deleting all comments.

And that’s it! All comments will be removed in one swift action. This method allows you to purge a document of comments rapidly.

How to Delete Comments Individually

Alternatively, you can delete comments one-by-one if you prefer to remove only certain comments. Here is how to delete individual comments:

1. Open your document in Microsoft Word and navigate to the first comment you want to delete.
2. Hover your mouse over the comment in the right margin.
3. A small, dark dialog box will appear. Click the X in the upper right corner.
4. The comment text and bubble along the right margin will disappear, deleting that comment.
5. Repeat steps 2-4 to continue deleting comments individually from the document.

This selective approach gives you more control to specify which comment threads to remove.

How to Delete Comment Bubbles but Keep the Comment Text

When you collaborate with others, you may find the comment bubbles or markers along the right margin distracting after receiving the feedback. You can clean up the margins by deleting comment bubbles but choose to keep the text comments visible in the document body. Here is how:

1. Select the Review tab > Delete drop-down menu.
2. Choose Delete All Markup in Document to delete only comment bubbles/markers.
3. The comment text will remain intact and visible in the document body, but the right margin is now clean without bubbles.

This allows you to eliminate the visual clutter of comment bubbles while still preserving the ability to see suggestions within the content.

Keyboard Shortcuts for Deleting Comments Rapidly

For power users, Word provides keyboard shortcuts to accelerate deleting comments from a document rather than mousing over each one:

• Ctrl + Shift + ; – Delete comment bubble/marker only
• Alt + Shift + C – Delete entire comment including text and bubble

Simply navigate your cursor to each comment in turn and use the relevant keyboard shortcut to remove comments swiftly.

When Comments Cannot Be Deleted

In some cases, you may find comments will not delete from a Word document even when you attempt to use the methods above. There are two main reasons this can happen:

• Insufficient user permissions – If the document is shared and you do not have edit rights, you may not have the ability to remove comments.
• Track Changes turned on – With Track Changes enabled, comments may be locked to maintain document history. Turn off Track Changes first.

Talk to the document owner or administrator to adjust permissions or settings to unlock the ability to delete comments as needed.

Best Practices for Managing Comments

Here are some top tips for effectively managing comments to keep documents organized:

• Resolve comments promptly – Address suggestions right away so comments do not linger unnecessarily.
• Set reminders to clean up comments so they do not pile up without being handled.
• Review older comments before adding new ones to limit duplication.
• Delete promptly once comments are no longer applicable.
• Restrict commenting access only to those who need to provide feedback.

Establishing practices for maintaining comments will help you easily manage collaborator suggestions on Word documents.

Conclusion

Whether you want to rapidly delete all comments at once or selectively remove individual comment threads, Microsoft Word provides the flexibility to clean up documents easily as needed. With the ability to purge comment text, delete the bubbles only, or use handy keyboard shortcuts, you control the methods that work best to organize your Word files.

By establishing strong commenting hygiene habits, addressing suggestions promptly, and clearing out obsolete comments swiftly, you can enable seamless collaboration with team members through Word while keeping documents clutter-free.