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You can control the vertical space between the lines of text in your document by setting the line spacing. Or, you can change the vertical space between paragraphs in your document by setting the spacing before or spacing after paragraphs. You can also choose to keep lines of text together or keep paragraphs together on a page.
Change the line spacing in an entire document
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Go to Design > Paragraph Spacing.
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Choose an option. To single space your document, select No Paragraph Space.
To return to the original settings later, go to Design > Paragraph Spacing and choose the option under Style Set. This may be Default or the name of style you’re currently using.
Change the line spacing in a portion of the document
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Select one or more paragraphs to update. Press Ctrl + A to select all.
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Go to Home > Line and Paragraph Spacing
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Select Line Spacing Options and choose an option in the Line spacing box.
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Adjust the Before and After settings to change spacing between paragraphs.
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Select OK.
For more info, see Adjust indents and spacing.
Change the line spacing in an entire document
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Go to Design > Paragraph Spacing.
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Choose the option you want. If you want to single space your document, choose No Paragraph Space.
This overrides the settings of the style you’re currently using. If you decide later to return to the original settings, go to Design > Paragraph Spacing and choose the option under Style Set. The option might be Default, as shown above, or it will show the name of style you’re currently using.
Change the line spacing in a portion of the document
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Select the paragraphs you want to change.
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Go to Home > Line and Paragraph Spacing.
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Choose the number of line spaces you want or select Line Spacing Options, and then select the options you want under Spacing.
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To change the spacing before or after each of the paragraphs in the text you selected, click the arrow next to Before or After and enter the amount of space that you want.
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Select OK.
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Select the paragraph whose lines you want to keep together.
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Go to Format > Paragraph >Line and Page Breaks.
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Select Keep lines together.
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Select the first of the two paragraphs that you want to keep together.
Tip: If you want to keep more than two paragraphs together, select all but the last paragraph.
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Go to Format > Paragraph.
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Go to Line and Page Breaks.
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Select Keep with next.
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Select OK.
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Select the paragraphs you want to change, or press Ctrl+A to select everything.
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Go to Home > Line Spacing.
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Choose the number of line spaces you want, or select Line Spacing Options and then select the options you want in the Paragraph dialog box under Spacing:
Tip: If you want to change the spacing before or after the selected paragraphs, select the arrows in the Before or After boxes, or type a number directly.
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You can change the spacing between characters of text for selected text or for particular characters. In addition, you can stretch or compress an entire paragraph to make it fit and look the way that you want it to.
Change the spacing between characters
Selecting Expanded or Condensed alters the spacing between all selected letters by the same amount. Kerning alters the spacing between particular pairs of letters — in some cases reducing and in other cases expanding the space depending upon the letters.
Expand or condense the space evenly between all the selected characters
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Select the text that you want to change.
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On the Home tab, click the Font Dialog Box Launcher, and then click the Advanced tab.
Note: If you’re using Word 2007 the tab is called Character Spacing.
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In the Spacing box, click Expanded or Condensed, and then specify how much space you want in the By box.
Kern the characters that are above a particular size
Kerning refers to the way spacing between two specific characters is adjusted. The idea is to give a better looking result by reducing the spacing between characters that fit together nicely (such as «A» and «V») and increasing the spacing between characters that don’t.
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Select the text that you want to change.
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On the Home tab, click the Font Dialog Box Launcher, and then click the Advanced tab.
Note: If you’re using Word 2007 the tab is called Character Spacing.
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Select the Kerning for fonts check box, and then enter the point size in the Points and above box.
Stretch or scale the text horizontally
When you scale the text, you change the shapes of the characters by percentages. You can scale text by stretching it or by compressing it.
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Select the text that you want to stretch or compress.
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On the Home tab, click the Font Dialog Box Launcher, and then click the Advanced tab.
Note: If you’re using Word 2007 the tab is called Character Spacing.
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In the Scale box, enter the percentage that you want.
Percentages above 100 percent stretch the text. Percentages below 100 percent compress the text.
Change the line spacing
To increase or decrease the amount of vertical space between lines of text within a paragraph, the best method is to modify the style the paragraph uses.
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Find the style you’re using in the Styles gallery on the Home tab.
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Right-click the style you want to change and select Modify.
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Near the center of the dialog box you’ll find the line spacing buttons that let you select single, 1.5x or double spaced. Choose the spacing you want to apply and click OK.
If you’d like to apply more specific line spacing to the style, clickthe Format button at the bottom left corner of the Modify Style dialog box and select Paragraph. The Line spacing drop-down lets you select or set more specific line spacing.
For more information on modifying styles in Word, see: Customize styles in Word.
See also
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Using Styles in Word — a free, 10-minute video training course.
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Change the font size
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Set page margins
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Align text left or right, center text, or justify text on a page
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Change the line spacing in Word
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Help us improve Word
Do you have suggestions about how we can improve Word? Let us know by providing us feedback. See How do I give feedback on Microsoft 365? for more information.
Need more help?
Are you searching for a more subtle way to make a heading or paragraph stand out, without using bold or enlarged text?
Expanding the characters may be the perfect solution for you.
Changing the spacing between the characters will make your text look bigger and bolder without actually increasing their size.
Alternatively, condensing the text will compress your text to fit into a smaller space. If you are trying to find a way to make your text fit on a single page, without reducing the text size to an un-readable size 8 font, reducing the space between the characters may be the solution you have been searching for.
Maybe you just want to reduce or expand the spacing between your characters to make your Word document more aesthetically pleasing.
Whatever your reason is for trying to change the spacing between your text characters in Word, in this post, we will show you how!
Changing the line spacing between letters in Microsoft Word
- Open your Word Document
- Highlight the text you want to change the spacing between
- Right-click on your highlighted text
- Click Font
- Under Font, find and click Advanced
- Click Spacing
- Select Expanded to increase the spacing between your characters, or Condensed to reduce the size of the spacing between your characters
- Press OK
You have now successfully adjusted the spacing between each character selected.
If you would like to expand or condense the spacing throughout your entire Microsoft Word document you can do so by highlighting the full text body and following the steps above.
Searching for a Better Way to Manage Version Control?
We’ve all been there when you are looking for the most recent version of a particular document to send onto your boss, client or team members and just can’t find it anywhere.
I swear it was saved in the client folder last week, but since then John from Legal has taken a look, made some changes and moved the file. Leaving you with 25 different versions in your folder, but a sneaking suspicion that presentation_updated_v5final_UPDATED still isn’t the most recent one.
With no easy way to name files and everyone on the team taking a different approach version control is a problem almost all of us face.
It makes sense to use the _v1 addition on the end of a document, adding the next subsequent number next to the _v but then someone adds the word _final on the end. Honestly thinking this is the final version before another team member makes some more edits leaving you with something along the lines of _v8_final_v4 and the list goes on…
Do you think this is a frustration we have faced since the start of time?
Wonder no more, because it is not a frustration of your future.
With more than enough of us facing the same version control frustrations, the amazing team at Simul Docs decided to create a simple and perfect (we might be biased, but it’s pretty damn perfect) solution to version control in Microsoft Word.
Simul Docs manages version control for you.
When a document is created, or edited with Simul, the purpose-built tool will automatically take over your version control. A new document is created and given the version number 0.0.1, that’s easy.
Then one of your colleagues open the document, make a few changes and press save, this version automatically becomes version 0.0.2 without your colleague even thinking about a file name or where it needs to be saved.
Simul takes care of your storage as well.
Each new version is neatly stored in the file’s version list, visible to any co-authors, making it easy for you to refer back to an old version anytime, or at a glance see who made edits each version and when they were done.
So, with Simul you can rest easy knowing your version control is under control and all of your documents are neatly stored away together, no matter who edits them opens them or requests to make a change.
Simul has you covered when it comes to version control, so why not try it out?
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Go to Home > Line and Paragraph Spacing. Choose the number of line spaces you want or select Line Spacing Options, and then select the options you want under Spacing.
Contents
- 1 How do you do 1.5 spacing on Word?
- 2 How do I get rid of double spacing between words in Word?
- 3 How do I change to 1.0 spacing in Word?
- 4 How do I change the spacing between paragraphs in Word?
- 5 How do I change line spacing in Word 2016?
- 6 How do you change line spacing in docs?
- 7 How do I get rid of unnecessary spaces in Word?
- 8 How do I change the spacing between words in Word 2010?
- 9 How do I fix justify spacing in Word?
- 10 Is 1.5 single spacing in Word?
- 11 How do I change the spacing in Word for Mac?
- 12 How do I change line spacing in Word Online?
- 13 How do I change the spacing between lines in Word 2013?
- 14 Why is my line spacing off in docs?
- 15 How do I reduce the space between bullets and text in Word?
- 16 How do I fix justify spacing in Word for Mac?
- 17 How do you control the word spacing in justified text with CSS?
- 18 How do you change line spacing in Word 2007?
To format line spacing:
- Click Format on the menu bar.
- Select Paragraph. The Paragraph dialog box appears.
- Click the Indents and Spacing tab.
- In the line spacing drop-down menu, you can select single, 1.5, or double spacing. The default is single spacing.
- Click OK.
How do I get rid of double spacing between words in Word?
Remove double line spacing
- Select the paragraph you want to change, or press Ctrl+A to select all text.
- Go to Home > Line and Paragraph Spacing.
- Select the line spacing you want.
- For more exact spacing, select Line Spacing Options, and make changes under Spacing.
How do I change to 1.0 spacing in Word?
Choose 1.0
- Select the paragraphs you want to change.
- Go to Home > Line and Paragraph Spacing .
- Choose 1.0.
How do I change the spacing between paragraphs in Word?
Change spacing between paragraphs
- Click anywhere in the paragraph you want to change.
- Go to Layout, and under Spacing, click the up or down arrows to adjust the distance before or after the paragraph. You can also type a number directly.
How do I change line spacing in Word 2016?
Go to Home > Line and Paragraph Spacing. Select Line Spacing Options, and then choose the options you want under Spacing. To change the spacing before or after the selected paragraphs, select the arrow next to Before or After and enter the amount of space that you want. Select Set as Default.
How do you change line spacing in docs?
Change line & paragraph spacing
- On your computer, open a document in Google Docs.
- Select the lines you want to change.
- Click Format. Line & paragraph spacing.
- Select a line spacing option: To change your paragraph spacing, click Single, 1.15, 1.5, or Double.
How do I get rid of unnecessary spaces in Word?
How to remove multiple extra spaces between words in Word
- Please press Ctrl + H to display the Find and Replace dialog.
- Press More button to show more options.
- After finish the settings, click Replace All to remove all extra spaces between words from the whole document.
How do I change the spacing between words in Word 2010?
Click the Line and Paragraph Spacing command in the Paragraph group on the Home tab. Select the desired spacing option from the drop-down menu. From the drop-down menu, you can also select Line Spacing Options to open the Paragraph dialog box. From here, you can adjust the line spacing with even more precision.
How do I fix justify spacing in Word?
Click the “Home” tab and then select the “Distributed” button in the Paragraph group. Alternatively, press “Ctrl-Shift-J.” This applies a full justification effect that evenly distributes spaces in both words and characters.
Is 1.5 single spacing in Word?
In the Paragraph dialog box, select one of the options from the dropdown menu under “Line spacing.” You can select single-, 1.5-, or double-spacing, or you can select “Multiple” and set your own custom line spacing. To apply your selected line spacing, select “OK.”
How do I change the spacing in Word for Mac?
Change the line spacing in Word for Mac
- Click Design > Paragraph Spacing.
- Click the option you want. If you want to single space your document, choose No Paragraph Space.
How do I change line spacing in Word Online?
Change the spacing in Word Online
- Select the paragraph(s) you wish to change.
- Click “Home” at the top of your screen and then the “Line Spacing” icon.
- In the dialog box, select an option and also set the distance you want to have before and after the paragraphs.
- Click “OK” to save the changes.
How do I change the spacing between lines in Word 2013?
To format line spacing:
- Select the text you want to format. Selecting text to format.
- On the Home tab, click the Line and Paragraph Spacing command. A drop-down menu will appear.
- Move the mouse over the various options.
- The line spacing will change in the document.
Why is my line spacing off in docs?
You will need to change that on the computer/desktop app (not the mobile app). When you’re on a computer, drag your cursor through the problem lines or press Ctrl + A to select your entire document. Then go to the line-spacing tool in the action bar and select Add/remove space before paragraph.
How do I reduce the space between bullets and text in Word?
Right-click, and then click Adjust List Indents. Change the distance of the bullet indent from the margin by clicking the arrows in the Bullet position box, or change the distance between the bullet and the text by clicking the arrows in the Text indent box.
How do I fix justify spacing in Word for Mac?
Right-click on the text, and click Paragraph. On the Indents and Spacing tab, click the drop-down next to Alignment, and click Justified, OK.
How do you control the word spacing in justified text with CSS?
How to control word-spacing in justified text with CSS?
- What you are looking for is the text-justify property, which can be used along with text-align: justify;
- The content below gives you the details about values that can be used with the text-justify property (copied from the MOZ page).
- none.
- auto.
- inter-word.
How do you change line spacing in Word 2007?
Select the text you want to format. Click the Line spacing command in the Paragraph group on the Home tab. Select a spacing option.
The Paragraph dialog box appears.
- Use the Line spacing drop-down menu to select a spacing option.
- Modify the before and after points to adjust line spacing as needed.
- Click OK.
In my last Microsoft Word tutorial, we adjusted the space between letters. Today, we’re going to adjust the space between words in Microsoft Word without altering the letter spacing.
A Word of Caution: You may be tempted to increase the space between words by adding multiple spaces. I strongly advise against this practice because adding unnecessary spaces (rather than making individual spaces bigger, as shown in this tutorial) can disturb other formatting in your document.
This tutorial is available as a YouTube video showing all the steps in real time.
Watch more than 200 other writing-related software tutorials on my YouTube channel.
The images below are from Word for Microsoft 365. These steps will also work in Word 2021, Word 2019, Word 2016, and Word 2013.
- Select the Home tab in the ribbon.
- (Optional) Select the Show/Hide button in the Paragraph group to reveal your document’s formatting.
- Select the part of the text you want to change. (Pro Tip: Press Ctrl + A to select the entire document.)
- Take note of your current font size in the Font Size menu. The default space between words is based on your current font size.
- Select the Replace button in the Editing group to open the Find and Replace dialog box.
- Place your cursor in the Find what text box and then press your spacebar once to create one space.
- Place your cursor in the Replace with text box and then press your spacebar once to create one space.
- Select the More button to expand the dialog box. (Disregard this step if your dialog box is already expanded.)
- Select the Format button.
- Select Font in the Format menu.
- Select a larger or smaller font size in the Size menu in the Replace Font dialog box. Alternatively, you can type a specific size into the text box at the top of the menu.
- Select the OK button.
- Select the Replace All button.
- A dialog box will report the number of replacements.
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- Select Yes if you want to expand the replacements to your whole document.
- Select No if you only want the replacements in the text you selected in step 3.
- Select the Close button.
The spacing between words should now be changed in your selected text.
- (Optional) Reselect the Show/Hide button to hide your formatting (see figure 2).
Related Resources
How to Adjust Line Spacing in Microsoft Word
How to Adjust Page Margins in Microsoft Word
Updated February 16, 2023