I have MS Office 2016 in 3 languages (English, Dutch and French) and Office 365 without MS Office (to use Teams).
Since I have this configuration the language is no longer automatically recognized in Word nor in other programs such as Outlook (although this option to do so is activated). Whatever I type, it is always interpreted as English. I usually type in Dutch or French. If a selected a text and mark it as another language, and after that insert a new word in Dutch, it is again interpreted as English. Adding the language to the Normal style does not help. Very annoying... Is there a solution for that problem?

Auiomatically detect language does not work all that great when it works.
Why not adopt paragraph or character styles that have the proofing language in them and apply those styles?

When you have something formatted with a proofing language attribute and you continue typing, that attribute carries into the new typing just as Bold or Italic formatting would. This is character-level formatting, not document level.

Charles Kenyon, I never had that problem in the past (with a few exceptions).
Even if I include the language in the Normal style (for instance Dutch), Word always thinks I am writing in English. And I am writing in 3 or 4 languages, so including the language in the style definition is not a good idea I think.

How are you combining languages, specifically? Does one and the same document contain text in more than one language? In that case, you should set up styles for each separate language.

Also, which is the display language in Windows? From experience, I know that Word tends to enforce the language specified in Windows 10 Settings.

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Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional

Sometimes 1 language, sometimes more languages. But in the past setting up styles was not needed. If I have to create every style a use in 3 languages this will complicate things a lot. In will be easier to use the taskbar, as I do now.
As I said, even if the language (for instance Dutch) is included in the style definitions, Word and Outlook think it is in English. Windows itself is in English

You can use character styles for the different languages, which will make things a bit less complex.

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Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional

I would say that setting up styles is always necessary in Word, at least if you are working with long documents. Word is a style-driven program and styles ensure consistency (in all aspects of formatting).

How are you using the taskbar? Are you switching input languages?

As I wrote in a previous message, Windows 10 (specifically) may enforce the system display language on your Word documents. This problem can be dealt with if you change the system language so that it matches the language you prefer to use as the default in Office.

Making the default proofing language consistent will help a lot, of course, but it won't fix the formatting in documents where it is already incorrect. Existing documents must be dealt with one by one.

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Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional

Of course I am using styles.
But including the language in a style does not solve the problem. Nor does changing the default proofing language. In a new doc without any text the taskbar show "English". If Dutch is included in the style definition even selecting a text in Dutch in a new doc doesn't change a thing.
I now made two macros and put a button in the quick access toolbar. Unfortunately, I have choosen two squares in a different color but the color isn't shown

Are you saying that language formatting is now consistent in new, blank documents? You have to start with that aspect, but a lot of manual work will also be required to fix existing issues in existing documents.

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Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional

No! I don't care about existing documents. In the past I did not have that problem. It's in NEW documents I have this problem.
I give it up, I will use my macros to put the selected text in Dutch or French

You can lead a horse to water...

No one here works for Microsoft. We cannot tell you the why of changes. This is a user-to-user support forum. The people responding on this forum are experienced users trying to tell you how to use the Word that is, not the one that was, nor the one that ought to be. That it was not a problem for you in the past indicates, to me at least, that you were lucky.

You can set keyboard shortcuts for language-specific character styles. Ctrl+Spacebar turns a character style off.* If you want to use macros for this instead of styles you can do that. You are making your document more complex under the hood than it needs to be.

You can make suggestions for Microsoft using the feedback mechanism in Word or UserVoice Word for Windows.


* Ctrl+Spacebar does more than that; it reverts the text to the formatting of the underlying paragraph style.

So have you successfully changed the default language or not? Have you tried to change the display language of the operating system, which is usually a big help, but not always possible (depending on the Windows installation).

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Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional

Word shows the buttons in monochrome when your theme overrides it. To see the buttons in color go to File : Options : General : Office theme and set it to White

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Andrew Lockton
Chrysalis Design, Melbourne Australia

Guessed: Thank you, this works!

No, I am using 2 macros instead. Changing the display language of Windows will not be a big Help, as I'm writing in more than one language.