In Microsoft Office 2003 and previous versions of Office, we had a nifty feature called Save My Settings Wizard that allowed us to export or backup Office settings. The tool was helpful while re-installing Office or switching to a new computer.
Starting from Office 2007, Microsoft omitted Save My Settings Wizard for reasons best known to the team behind Office at Microsoft. Ever since the release of Office 2007, users have been asking Microsoft to include an option to backup personal settings but the option is missing from Office 2010, Office 2013 and the upcoming Office 2016 (currently in Beta). The recent versions of Office programs allow you import and export Quick Access Toolbar settings only.
A quick web search reveals that there is a paid software out there to backup Microsoft Office settings but the software is really expensive.
Backup Microsoft Office settings for free
Luckily, the recently released CloneApp software enables you backup Office 2010 and Office 2013 settings for free. For those who are not aware, CloneApp is a free software designed to help Windows OS users backup and restore application settings with ease on Windows operating system.
While the current version of CloneApp doesn’t support backing up Office 2016 settings, Office 2016 support will be added before Microsoft releases the final version of Office 2016 by the end of this year.
When you select Office Word 2010/2013 in CloneApp, it backs up Word settings, templates (normal.dot) and unsaved files, if any. Likewise, it backs up Outlook e-mail accounts, data files (.PST), personal folder files (.OST) in version 2007 and 2010.
As you can see in the picture, the tool supports all the programs in Microsoft Office, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote.
The tool also enables you backup Office activation files, very helpful feature when you want to re-install Windows operating system.
To backup Microsoft Office 2010/2013 settings
Step 1: Visit this page and download newest version of CloneApp.
Step 2: Extract the zip file to a folder and launch CloneApp with admin rights. Note that CloneApp is a standalone application, meaning it can be launched without an installation.
Step 3: After launching CloneApp, select Office applications that you want to backup, and then click Start CloneApp to begin the backup job. Location of backed up files can be found by navigating to CloneApp Options.
If you’re getting an error while backing up files, it could be because you have launched CloneApp with admin rights. Please run the software as administrator (right-click and then click Run as administrator) to gain access to all Office files.
To restore the backup, select your Office applications and then click Restore button. That’s it!
By the way, if you are unable to backup Office settings using CloneApp, you can go for the paid Office Backup Wizard 2013 software. Do let us know if you are aware of a better software for the same job.
