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How to uninstall Microsoft Office on Mac completely

By Mohammed Chaara · Updated October 22, 2026 · 4 min read · Checked on macOS 26 Tahoe. How these guides are made

App Uninstaller in MrFixable

To uninstall Microsoft Office on Mac, quit the Office apps, move Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote from Applications to the Trash, then delete their folders in ~/Library/Containers and three UBF8T346G9 folders in ~/Library/Group Containers, and restart. You need an administrator account. Back up Outlook data before you start.

These are Microsoft's own steps, and they work the same for Microsoft 365, Office 2024 and Office 2021 for Mac. Office has no uninstaller, and dragging the apps to the Trash leaves their data behind. Some of that data, in Group Containers, is shared by all the Office apps, which matters if you only want to remove one of them.

Uninstall Office by hand

  1. Quit every Office app, including Outlook.
  2. Open Finder › Applications, hold ⌘ (Command) and click each Office app to select them all: Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft OneNote.
  3. Right-click the selection and choose Move to Trash. Enter your administrator password if macOS asks.
  4. In Finder, press ⇧⌘G (or choose Go › Go to Folder…), type ~/Library and press Return.
  5. Open Containers and move these folders to the Trash. Some may not be there:
    • Microsoft Error Reporting
    • Microsoft Excel
    • com.microsoft.netlib.shipassertprocess
    • com.microsoft.Office365ServiceV2
    • Microsoft Outlook
    • Microsoft PowerPoint
    • com.microsoft.RMS-XPCService
    • Microsoft Word
    • Microsoft OneNote
  6. Go back to Library, open Group Containers and move these folders to the Trash, if they're there:
    • UBF8T346G9.ms
    • UBF8T346G9.Office
    • UBF8T346G9.OfficeOsfWebHost
  7. If any Office app is in your Dock, right-click it and choose Options › Remove from Dock.
  8. Restart your Mac, then empty the Trash.

Microsoft warns that these steps remove Outlook data, so back up those folders before you delete them if you use Outlook on this Mac.

Finder shows some Containers folders by the app's name, like Microsoft Word, even though the folder's real name is the app's ID. Either way, the names in the list above are what you'll see in Finder.

Removing just one Office app

You don't have to remove all of Office. To remove only one app, say Word:

  1. Quit Word and move Microsoft Word from Applications to the Trash.
  2. In ~/Library/Containers, move the Microsoft Word folder to the Trash.
  3. Leave the three UBF8T346G9 folders in Group Containers alone. They hold data the other Office apps still use.

Once the last Office app is gone, delete the Group Containers folders and the rest of the Containers list above.

Uninstall Office apps in one step

App Uninstaller in MrFixable removes one app at a time, together with the files named after it:

  1. Open App Uninstaller in MrFixable and drop an Office app, like Microsoft Word, onto it, or click Choose App… and pick it from Applications.
  2. Check the list. It shows each leftover with its path, and the size of the ones it can measure. Files named after the app's ID, like Word's folder in Containers, are ticked.
  3. Click Move to Trash and confirm. If the app is open, App Uninstaller quits it first. Office apps from Microsoft's installer belong to the system, so Finder asks for your password to move them.
  4. Repeat for each Office app you want to remove.

App Uninstaller only lists folders named after the app you chose, so it leaves the shared UBF8T346G9 folders in Group Containers alone, and the other Office apps keep working. After you've removed the last Office app, delete those three folders and any Microsoft folders still in ~/Library/Containers by hand, as in steps 5 and 6 above. Everything goes to the Trash, so you can put it back until you empty it.

For how leftovers work with other apps, see how to uninstall apps on a Mac completely.

Questions

Does uninstalling Office delete my documents?

No. Your Word, Excel and PowerPoint files stay wherever you saved them, like Documents or OneDrive. Uninstalling removes the apps and their data folders. The exception is Outlook: Microsoft warns that deleting the Office folders removes Outlook data on your Mac, so back them up first if you need it.

Does uninstalling Office cancel Microsoft 365?

No. Removing the apps from your Mac doesn't change your Microsoft 365 subscription, and billing continues as usual. To stop paying, cancel it from your Microsoft account online. You can also keep the subscription and install Office again later from your Microsoft account by signing in.

Can I uninstall just Word or Outlook and keep the rest of Office?

Yes. Move only that app to the Trash and delete its own folder in ~/Library/Containers, like Microsoft Word. Leave the UBF8T346G9 folders in ~/Library/Group Containers alone, because the Office apps you're keeping still use them. Delete those only after removing the last Office app.

Why does my Mac ask for a password to uninstall Office?

Office apps installed with Microsoft's installer belong to the system, not to your user account. Microsoft says you must be signed in as an administrator, or enter an administrator name and password, to remove them. Enter your Mac login password if your account is an administrator.

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