who to recover unsaved word document

If you are running Office 2011 for Mac (whether as part of Office 365 or not) the correct path to the AutoRecovery-folder is this :

~/Users/username/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Office/Office 2011 AutoRecovery

And if you are running Office 2016 for Mac (whether or not as part of Office 365) the correct path to the Word 15‘s AutoRecovery-folder(s) is :

~/Users/username/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Word/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery/

for PowerPoint 15 the correct path is :

~/Users/username/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.PowerPoint/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery/

and for Excel 15 the correct path is :

~/Users/username/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Excel/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery/

Maybe you can try uFlysoft Data Recovery for Mac, it can recover LOST DATA on Mac only in three steps:

Step 1. Launch the software to scan the device where your files deleted

Step 2: Preview the scan result files and make mark if it is the one you find

Step 3: Recover files

Word is NOT an Apple product.

Best place to ask as it’s their product:

Microsoft Office Forums:

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice?auth=1

or here:

http://www.msofficeforums.com/office/

I tried all the methods on the internet for finding old versions of my word file but it's just not there. I have only a few files in my autorecovery folder and those are pretty old ones. The more I read about this, the more I feel this is a Mac issue. I had windows before this and I simply recovered my files. Anything Apple company is doing to fix this bug?

Well, I'm not a Word for Mac user, but I teach Office for Microsoft. There is an Options area, so you need to determine how to get there. Once in Options, there should be an option for Save. There allows you to set the autosave timing, and also determine the location for the autosave. Now, here is another bit of info I cannot really answer because I'm not familiar with Mac, is what happens when you close without saving. Microsoft version will prompt you about saving. If you decline to save the file, the Office 2016 version will temporarily retain the autosave, but only a short period of time, because you clicked on the decline to save. i'm looking for additional info about how Mac works, but you can go over the the Microsoft Office area on the Microsoft website and check their help forum for Office for Mac.

EDIT: This refers to the Windows version, but it may help you get somewhere. I was able to recover two files that I had created and refused to save when testing this for you. Again, you will need to get the Mac version instructions for this. Good luck.

It is going to depend on your Autosave settings, if the file was autosaved, and the location that you have the file set to save at. From there, did you purposely close Word and decline saving it?

If the document exists and opens when you click on it, it was autosaved.

If it doesn't or you cannot locate it, it wasn't and is lost.

You might try asking your Microsoft Office question in the Microsoft Office help forums located here: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice