Miss the Old Office Interface? Here's How to Get It Back

Microsoft Office New Theme Guide: How to Recover Classic Themes?

Did you notice that your Microsoft Office application looks a little different lately? That's because the new default Office theme is in effect. I personally like the new look, but if you don't, you can restore to the old theme.

What are the differences in new Office themes?

Before we introduce how to restore an old Office theme, let's take a look at the changes made in the new theme:

1. Default Fonts: After more than 15 years, Microsoft has removed Calibri from Office's default fonts. Instead, Aptos, which is very similar to Calibri, but is clearer in definition and easier to read.
2. Palette: You will notice that when creating tables and inserting shapes, purple has replaced the yellow in the palette and the colors are usually more vivid.
3. Contour Weight: The outline of the shape and object is now more obvious.

These changes are designed to make your documents more modern and accessible, but if you prefer to keep the old style, you can easily switch back to the older Office theme. Here is how to do this in different applications.

How to Recover Old Themes in Word

In Microsoft Word, go to the Design tab and select Theme to open the theme library.

Select "Office 2013-2022 Theme" to switch to the old theme.

How to restore old themes in PowerPoint

In PowerPoint, switch to the Design tab and click the drop-down menu to view all available topics.

Click "Office 2013-2022 Theme" to restore the old theme.

How to restore classic themes in Excel

In Excel, switch to the Page Layout tab, and click Theme. This will open the theme library. Click the Office 2013-2022 theme to restore the old theme.

Restore the old version of Office theme only works for the current document. If you don't want to switch themes every time you open a new document, you need to set the old theme as the default theme.

Set the old Office theme as the default theme in Word

In Word, after switching to the old theme, click the Set as Default button.

You will receive a message asking you to confirm this action. Click Yes.

Set the classic Office theme as the default theme in PowerPoint

To set the old theme as the default theme in PowerPoint, right-click the Office 2013-2022 theme and select Set as default theme.

Set the old Office theme as the default theme in Excel

Unfortunately, setting up a new default theme in Excel is not as simple as it is in Word and PowerPoint. There are no convenient buttons to set a new default theme, so as a workaround, you need to create a template with the old Office theme and create a new workbook from this template. Here is how to do it.

First, create a blank workbook and apply the Office 2013-2022 topic. Name the file "book" and save it as an Excel template (the ".xlxt" file).

Note the location where you saved the file, or better yet, save it to your desktop so you can find it easily.

Now click File>Options>Trust Center. Open Trust Center Settings and navigate to the Trusted Locations tab.

Find options that display "Excel Default Location: Excel Start".

Double-click it and copy the file path.

Next, close Excel and open File Explorer. Paste the file path into the address bar to open the XLSTART folder.

Move the template file you created earlier to the XLSTART folder. You need to grant administrator permissions to complete the move.

After successfully moving the file, open Excel again and navigate to "File" > "Options" > "General". Scroll down and uncheck the option to show "Show startup screen when starting this application".

Now, every time you open Excel, it creates a new document using the old topic.

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It's that - how to restore the Office theme you are familiar with and love. If you want to learn more about how to change the appearance of Office applications, you can also explore how to enable dark mode or change the color theme of Microsoft Office applications.

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