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Removing comments, ink and annotations from Word, Excel and PowerPoint files

Last updated: 17 October 2026

What counts as a comment or an annotation

• Comments and replies. Word and PowerPoint keep a comment with its replies as one thread. In Excel, Microsoft's page The difference between threaded comments and notes explains that comments are now threaded, for discussion, and that notes work the way comments did in earlier versions. A workbook can hold both.
• Resolved threads. Resolving closes a thread; it does not delete it. Microsoft's pages describe the same in each program: in Word a resolved comment is hidden from the default view and shown again in the list view (Using modern comments in Word); in Excel it is still viewable but takes no more replies until it is reopened (the threaded comments page above); in PowerPoint a resolved thread leaves the margin but stays in the Comments pane (Modern comments in PowerPoint).
• The authors. Each comment carries its author's name, and depending on the program the file can also keep a separate list of the people who commented.
• Ink. Pen and highlighter strokes drawn from the Draw tab, in any of the three programs (Draw and write with ink in Office). Document Inspector calls them ink annotations.

Where each program keeps them

Inside the file (a ZIP of separate parts, as ECMA-376 describes) each kind has its own parts. These are the usual names in files saved by current versions:

• Word: word/comments.xml holds the comment text; word/commentsExtended.xml holds which comment replies to which and whether a thread is resolved; word/people.xml can hold more about the people who wrote comments or changes.
• Excel: threaded comments in xl/threadedComments with the people in xl/persons; notes in xl/comments1.xml and the like, with the notes' authors in the same part and the boxes they are drawn in.
• PowerPoint: comments in ppt/comments, with the authors in ppt/authors.xml (or ppt/commentAuthors.xml in older files).
• Ink: each drawing is a separate part in InkML, the format Microsoft names in [MS-ODRAWXML], next to the page, sheet or slide it is drawn on.

Emptying a comment's text leaves the comment, its author and its place in the thread. Delete the whole thread.

Removing them all at once

In Word, Excel and PowerPoint for Windows, Document Inspector removes them together. Open File › Info › Check for Issues › Inspect Document, keep the comments and annotations item selected, select Inspect, then select Remove All beside its results; save the copy and check it again. Microsoft's Document Inspector page lists "Comments" and "Ink annotations" under Comments, Revisions, Versions, and Annotations in Word, and under Comments and Annotations in Excel and PowerPoint. In Word the same inspector also removes "Revision marks from tracked changes": if you mean to keep tracked changes for the recipient, it is not the tool for that file. The same page recommends using it "on a copy of your original document, because it is not always possible to restore the data that the Document Inspector removes."

Two limits from the same page. An Excel workbook saved as a shared workbook cannot have its comments and annotations removed until you copy it and turn sharing off. And in PowerPoint, once you have removed personal information this way, PowerPoint keeps removing it each time you save that file until you change the setting, which also drops the names next to new comments.

If your version has no Document Inspector, delete them with the program's own commands. In Word, a comment's More thread actions menu deletes that thread, and in Word for Windows, Review › Delete › Delete All Comments in Document removes them all. In Excel, right-click the cell and choose Delete Comment, or Delete Note for a note. In PowerPoint, delete each thread from the Comments pane. Remove ink with the Eraser on the Draw tab, or select a drawing and delete it. Then check the copy as below, since there is no list to confirm against.

What a PDF export does with them

Comments and ink can appear in a PDF. Check the export options of the program and version you use, rather than assuming they follow your print settings. For PowerPoint for Windows, Microsoft's page Save PowerPoint presentations as PDF files lists comments and ink among the things the Options dialog can include. A picture of ink that stays in the file is ordinary visible content and goes into the PDF with the page. In Word, publishing the document showing markup puts the tracked changes and comments into the PDF. More on what an export carries is in Office metadata when you export to PDF. A PDF is not a fix if the recipient needs the editable file: then the comments have to come out of the Office file itself.

What deleting comments does not remove

• The author in the properties. The author and last saved by of the document are document properties, not comments. See removing the author's name from a Word file.
• Tracked changes. In Word they carry names and times of their own. Accept or reject them: see accepting or rejecting tracked changes.
• Speaker notes in PowerPoint. Notes are not comments; see speaker notes and hidden slides.
• Remarks typed into the content. A note typed into a cell, a text box or the body ("check with legal") is content. No comment tool finds it; read the file.
• The look of the ink. Ink is often saved together with a picture of the strokes, for programs that cannot read ink. Removing the ink data leaves that picture, so the strokes still show; if the recipient should not see them, erase them in the program.

How to check the copy yourself

1. Open the copy you will send and show all comments: the Comments pane in Word and PowerPoint, Review › Show Comments and Show All Notes in Excel. Include resolved threads.
2. On the Draw tab, look for strokes on each page, sheet or slide.
3. For a closer look, rename a copy to .zip and open it: the parts listed above should be gone. Search the XML parts for a reviewer's name. Finding nothing this way does not show there is nothing, but finding a name shows something is left.

What ScrubDrop does

ScrubDrop reads .docx, .xlsx and .pptx files in your browser; the file is not uploaded. It lists comments with their replies and authors (open and resolved threads alike, and Excel's notes), and ink, with every other kind of hidden data it finds. For free, it removes the comments with their replies and the author lists, the document properties, and tracked changes by accepting them, one file at a time. Removing ink is part of ScrubDrop Pro: the ink data goes and the picture that was showing is kept, so the page looks the same and the strokes still show. The result is read again by software separate from the one that wrote it, and a file that does not pass is not offered. ScrubDrop does not judge what is typed into the content, and it refuses PDFs.

Questions

Sources: the Microsoft pages linked on this page were checked on 17 October 2026.