You might see that the Dropbox Community team have been busy working on some major updates to the Community itself! So, here is some info on what’s changed, what’s staying the same and what you can expect from the Dropbox Community overall.

Forum Discussion

LisaMac's avatar
LisaMac
Explorer | Level 3
10 months ago

problem opening documents in dropbox app on laptop "word unable to read this document"

Hi there I have one dropbox account for work purposes.  After working perfectly, I'm now having issues with the dropbox app on windows laptop.  Error message: "word is unable to read this document....
Desktop
Edit
Error Messages
Microsoft Office
Nancy's avatar
Nancy
Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
10 months ago

Welcome aboard the forum, LisaMac! Let’s take a look. 

 

If you open your web Dropbox account and download a file to another location on your computer (outside of Dropbox), can you open it normally then? 

 

Can you provide a screenshot of the error you’re receiving, as well as one more showing the syncing icons next to the files you can’t open on the desktop app?

 

Keep me posted for any updates.

  • SigurdurBjornsson's avatar
    SigurdurBjornsson
    Explorer | Level 3
    8 months ago

    Hi Nancy, 

     

    I'm having a similar problem. I just got a new computer and installed the Dropbox app and added my dropbox folders to the folder system on my pc. Everything was working perfectly on my old one, but now I get this error message for every Word document: 

    I can't open any documents actually. I can download documents from Dropbox web and open them though. Then there are these sync signs on every document: 

    Everything seems to be working normally on my old pc. 

    I am paying for additional storage space.

    I would very much appreciate help on this. 

     

    All the best, Sigurdur

    • Jay's avatar
      Jay
      Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
      8 months ago

      Hi SigurdurBjornsson, this looks like an orange box icon, which could indicate a conflict with OneDrive on your machine, is it currently running?

       

      Could you try marking those files as available offline to see if this helps with opening them?

      • SigurdurBjornsson's avatar
        SigurdurBjornsson
        Explorer | Level 3
        8 months ago

        Hi Jay, thanks for the reply

         

        I'm not logged into OneDrive. 

        It's so strange, most of my files have this orange box on them and I can't access it. Three times this has happened but after a while and/or restarting my PC everything is back to normal.

        It's very inconvenient not being able to access my files, I use Dropbox every single day for all my work files. Do you know if there is any way to prevent this from happening?

         

        All the best, Sigurður 

About Delete, edit, and organize

Solve issues with deleting, editing, and organizing files and folders in your Dropbox account with support from the Dropbox Community.

Need more support

If you need more help you can view your support options (expected response time for an email or ticket is 24 hours), or contact us on X or Facebook.

For more info on available support options for your Dropbox plan, see this article.

If you found the answer to your question in this Community thread, please 'like' the post to say thanks and to let us know it was useful!