Uninstall Guide
How to fully uninstall Microsoft Office on Mac
Microsoft Office installs a shared Group Container used by all apps (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams). Plus separate Containers for each app. Simply dragging them to Trash leaves 500 MB to 2 GB behind.
8+
Leftover locations
500 MB–2 GB
Typical leftover size
Group Containers
Key location
What Microsoft Office leaves behind
The most important location is the Group Container. All Microsoft Office apps share a folder at ~/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.Office/. This folder contains shared data that persists even after you delete all the individual apps.
| Location | Contents |
|---|---|
| ~/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.*/ | Sandboxed data for each Office app (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.) |
| ~/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.Office/ | Shared Microsoft Office group container — often the largest leftover |
| ~/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.ms/ | Microsoft shared data |
| ~/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/ | Office app data, MAU updater data |
| ~/Library/Preferences/com.microsoft.*.plist | User preferences for each Office app |
| ~/Library/Caches/com.microsoft.*/ | Office app caches |
| ~/Library/Saved Application State/com.microsoft.*.savedState/ | Window state for each app |
| ~/Library/Logs/Microsoft/ | Microsoft app logs |
Complete removal (step-by-step)
- 1. Quit all Microsoft appsPress ⌘Q in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams, and OneNote.
- 2. Delete the app bundlesOpen /Applications → delete Word.app, Excel.app, PowerPoint.app, Outlook.app, Teams.app, OneNote.app.
- 3. Delete the shared Group Container (most important)Press ⌘ Shift G →
~/Library/Group Containers→ deleteUBF8T346G9.OfficeandUBF8T346G9.ms. - 4. Delete per-app ContainersNavigate to
~/Library/Containersand delete all folders starting withcom.microsoft.. - 5. Remove Application Support dataDelete
~/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/. - 6. Clear preferences and cachesIn
~/Library/Preferences, delete allcom.microsoft.*.plistfiles. In~/Library/Caches, deletecom.microsoft.*folders. - 7. Empty TrashWhen you're confident, empty the Trash to permanently free disk space.
Automated removal with Zapper
Zapper scans all 11 Library directories including Containers and Group Containers. Drop any Office app onto Zapper — it shows every related file, including the shared UBF8T346G9.Office container that most people miss.