KutoolsforOffice — One Suite. Five Tools. Get More Done.

Pick up where you left off in Word: Resume reading easily

AuthorSiluviaLast modified

When working with long Word documents—contracts, research papers, reports, or books—it’s easy to lose your place. Scrolling through dozens of pages to find where you last stopped wastes valuable time and breaks your workflow. Thankfully, Microsoft Word offers a feature called "Resume Reading" to help you continue right where you left off.

But what if the built-in feature doesn’t work reliably, or doesn’t appear at all? That’s where Kutools for Word comes in, offering an enhanced Resume Reading tool that works automatically every time you open a document—no clicking, no shortcuts required.

In this tutorial, we’ll explore:

Why “Pick Up Where You Left Off” Matters

Office Tab: Brings tabbed interfaces to Word, Excel, PowerPoint...
Navigate through documents using Office Tab
Enhance your workflow now.      Learn More about Office Tab       Free Download

Whether you're editing a multi-page legal document or reading a lengthy manuscript, knowing exactly where you stopped last time helps you resume your work more efficiently. Without this feature, users often rely on memory or add temporary bookmarks, which can be error-prone and inconvenient.

“Pick up where you left off” ensures that when you re-open a Word document, you're instantly brought back to the previous spot—saving time and effort, especially for long, non-linear editing tasks.

Manually Resume Reading in Word

Microsoft Word provides two manual methods to return to your previous position in a document: the Resume Reading icon and the Shift + F5 keyboard shortcut. While helpful, these methods require some user interaction and are not always visible or consistent.

Use the Built-in “Resume Reading” Icon

When you reopen a document in Word (Microsoft 365, Word 2016 or later), you may see a small prompt at the right side of the document that says:

Welcome back! Pick up where you left off.

a screenshot of the resume reading icon

This clickable prompt appears briefly and brings you to your last editing or reading location.

Steps:

  1. Open a document you were previously working on.
  2. A prompt will show on the right side of the screen saying “Pick up where you left off”.
  3. Click that prompt.
    a screenshot of the small resume reading icon

Then Word will instantly scroll to your last editing or reading position.

Note: Sometimes this prompt may not appear. In that case, use the shortcut key below to return to your last editing or reading position.

Use Shortcut Key: Shift + F5

If the resume prompt doesn’t appear, Word also allows you to jump back to your most recent editing or reading location using a shortcut.

Shortcut:

  1. Press Shift + F5 after opening a document.
  2. Word will take you to the last place where you edit or read last time.

This works even if the “Pick up where you left off” prompt doesn’t show up.

Limitations of Word’s Default Behavior

While helpful, Word’s native resume reading tools have several limitations:

  • ❌ No True Auto-Jump
    You always have to click the prompt or press a shortcut—there’s no fully automatic resume experience.
  • ❌ Prompt Is Unreliable
    The “Welcome back” message doesn’t always appear. It may be suppressed:
    • If you saved the file with a new name.
    • If you opened the file on a different device.
    • If Word crashed or autosave failed.
  • ❌ Doesn’t Work Across Copies
    If you email the file to yourself or move it to another folder, the saved reading position is lost.

Automatically Resume Reading with Kutools for Word

Kutools for Word improves the reading experience by automatically triggering Word’s built-in “Pick Up Where You Left Off” function. Once enabled, Kutools takes you directly to your last reading position each time you reopen a document—no manual clicks or shortcuts required.

How to Use Kutools' Resume Reading Feature

After downloading and installing Kutools for Word.

  1. Open any Word document.
  2. Go to the Kutools tab in the ribbon and click Resume Reading to enable it.

From now on, Kutools will automatically track your reading position.

The next time you open the same document, it instantly scrolls to where you left off—no need to click or press anything.

Try Kutools for Word today and bring true continuity to your Word workflow.

Conclusion

The “Pick Up Where You Left Off” feature in Word is a powerful time-saver—but only when it works. Word’s built-in tools are helpful but inconsistent and manual.

If you need a more reliable, automatic, and reading-focused solution, Kutools for Word’s Resume Reading feature is the ideal upgrade. With zero clicks or shortcuts needed, it ensures you always land exactly where you left off—no matter how long your document is.

Best Office Productivity Tools

Kutools for Word - Elevate Your Word Experience with Over 100 Remarkable Features!

🤖 Kutools AI Features: AI Assistant / Real-Time Assistant / Super Polish (Preserve Format) / Super Translate (Preserve Format) / AI Redaction / AI Proofread...

📘 Document Mastery: Split Pages / Merge Documents / Export Selection in Various Formats (PDF/TXT/DOC/HTML...) / Batch Convert to PDF...

✏ Contents Editing: Batch Find and Replace across Multiple Files / Resize All Pictures / Transpose Table Rows and Columns / Convert Table to Text...

🧹 Effortless Clean: Sweap away Extra Spaces / Section Breaks / Text Boxes / Hyperlinks / For more removing tools, head to the Remove group...

➕ Creative Inserts: Insert Thousand Separators / Check Boxes / Radio Buttons / QR Code / Barcode / Multiple Pictures / Discover more in the Insert group...

🔍 Precision Selections: Pinpoint Specific Pages / Tables / Shapes / Heading Paragraphs / Enhance navigation with more Select features...

⭐ Star Enhancements: Navigate to Any Location / Auto-Insert Repetitive Text / Toggle Between Document Windows / 11 Conversion Tools...

🌍 Supports 40+ Languages: Use Kutools in your preferred language – supports English, Spanish, German, French, Chinese, and 40+ others!

Kutools for Word
 
 

Office Tab - Brings Tabbed interface to Office, Make Your Work Much Easier

  • Enable tabbed editing and reading in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, Access, Visio and Project.
  • Open and create multiple documents in new tabs of the same window, rather than in new windows.
  • Increases your productivity by 50%, and reduces hundreds of mouse clicks for you every day!
Free Download     Buy Now     Learn More
 

✨ Kutools for Office – One Installation, Five Powerful Tools!

Includes Office Tab Pro · Kutools for Excel · Kutools for Outlook · Kutools for Word · Kutools for PowerPoint

📦 Get all 5 tools in one suite | 🔗 Seamless integration with Microsoft Office | ⚡ Save time and boost productivity instantly

Best Office Productivity Tools

Kutools for Word - 100+ Tools for Word

Free DownloadBuy NowLearn More about Kutools