Word count dropped but the number of words hasn't changed

Using Word online is not only a pain, but may cause problems if your document has any complexity.

How do you know that the number of words is changing? There are a number of "word counts" in Word.

The one in the Status bar is usually good but may take a while to catch up when you open a document. Try hitting Ctrl+End followed by Ctrl+Home to force a quicker update.

You can include a DocProperty Words field to give you a Word count in your document and eventually delete it when you no longer need it.

To do that, type "DocProperty Words" without the quotation marks. Then select that and press Ctrl+F9 followed by F9. On your computer you may have to include the Fn key when using function keys.

Which update and version of Word are you using? File > Account > About Word

Are you using tracked changes?

Does the problem show up if you start Word in safe mode? Open Office apps in safe mode on a Windows PC - Microsoft Office