My Word documents open with Comments shown on the right-hand side of the page, I would like to have the comments NOT shown on opening, only until wanted.
I've navigated to Normal.DotM
(C:\Users\my name\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates)


and made the change there and saved the file but it doesn't solve the problem; any ideas?

This is NOT something you change in your Normal.dotm file.
You seldom want to open that file for editing and it should never have text or images in it. I will come back with more about comments.
Are you using Word 2021 in Windows?



The Normal.dot template is not used in any version of Word after Word 2004.

Display of comments is controlled under the Review tab.

The screenshot above shows my settings. You start by clicking on the dialog launcher in the corner of the markup group.

My settings show comments in balloons when there are any.
I do not enable "Modern Comments."

You would want to uncheck Comments in the options above.


Try having only one document open when you set these. Save and close the document and Word. I am guessing that the settings will then be active next time you open another document.

Stefan Blom is a regular contributor here and knows much more about Comments than I do.

I am changing your question title to better reflect the problem you are trying to solve.How to post a question on this MSOffice forum

Thank you for your answer.
I look forward to a reply from Stefan Blom

If you are using the "classic" comment interface, you can collapse the comments so that they look like small callouts. Just select the "Simple Markup" view on the Review tab. Doing this will also create a simplified view of tracked changes. The Changed Lines in the margin will show up but nothing else (if the document contains tracked changes).

You can disable modern comments by clearing the option "Enable modern comments" at File > Options > General and then restarting Word.

Note that if you are using the modern comments interface, as far as I know, there is no way to hide comments (besides creating a version of the document in which you delete all comments of course).

Attached Images

CommentsCollapsed.png (52.0 KB, 7 views)

__________________
Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional

Thank you, Stefan. That was such an easy fix. This has been bothering me for months. I have no idea why I didn't come here sooner. Thanks again

I am glad I could help.

Since Microsoft has claimed that modern comments will be the only option some time in the future, resorting to classic comments will stop working sooner or later, unfortunately. :-(

__________________
Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional