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You can control where Word and Outlook position automatic page breaks by setting pagination options.
Keep lines of a paragraph together on a page or in a column
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Select the paragraphs that contain lines you want to keep together.
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On the Home tab in Word, or on the FORMAT TEXT tab in an Outlook email, select the Paragraph Dialog Box launcher
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Select the Line and Page Breaks tab.
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Under Pagination, select Keep lines together.
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Select OK.
.Keep paragraphs together on a page or in a column
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Select the paragraphs you want to keep together on a page.
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On the Home tab in Word, or on the FORMAT TEXT tab in an Outlook email, select the Paragraph Dialog Box launcher
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Select the Line and Page Breaks tab.
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Under Pagination, select Keep with next.
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Select OK.
Always force a page break before a paragraph
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Select the paragraph that you want to follow the page break.
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On the Home tab in Word, or on the FORMAT TEXT tab in an Outlook email, select the Paragraph Dialog Box launcher
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Select the Line and Page Breaks tab.
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Under Pagination, select Page break before.
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Select OK.
Control widow and orphan lines
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Select the paragraphs in which you want to control widows and orphans.
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On the Home tab in Word, or on the FORMAT TEXT tab in an Outlook email, select the Paragraph Dialog Box launcher
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Select the Line and Page Breaks tab.
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Under Pagination, select Widow/Orphan control.
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Select OK.
Note: This option is turned on by default.
Suppress line numbers from a paragraph or paragraphs
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Select the paragraph or paragraphs.
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On the Home tab in Word, or on the FORMAT TEXT tab in an Outlook email, select the Paragraph Dialog Box launcher
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Select the Line and Page Breaks tab.
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Under Formatting, select Suppress line numbers.
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Select OK.
Remove hyphens from a paragraph or paragraphs
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Select the paragraph or paragraphs.
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On the Home tab in Word, or on the FORMAT TEXT tab in an Outlook email, select the Paragraph Dialog Box launcher
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Select the Line and Page Breaks tab.
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Under Formatting, select Don’t hyphenate.
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Select OK.
Text box options
You can use the text box options to more tightly wrap the text that surrounds the text box. To use these options, the text box border must be transparent (no line and no fill), and the Wrap Text must be set at Tight or Through.
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Inside the text box, right-click, and then select Paragraph.
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Select the Line and Page Breaks tab.
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Under Textbox options, in the Tight wrap list, select one of the following:
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All
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First and Last Lines
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First Line Only
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Last Line Only
Note: To undo changes, select None.
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Select OK.
Need more help?
When we see two lines of words in an MS Word document, we don’t get to see what is separating them. There are severl characters that act as line break. There are several names; line break, new line, carriage return, paragraph break etc.
Today, while doing a bit of data processing, I was required to remove all the line breaks (carriage return) in an MS-Word document and replace line breaks with a comma. I was processing a long list of email addresses with one email address per line. And I wanted this list to become a comma separated list (CSV); so as to use it somewhere else.
In MS-Word, paragraph break is represented by invisible character (¶) which looks like a horizontally flipped P letter. You can toggle the visibility of this character by clicking a button given on the Home tab in MS Word. The button bears the same ¶ symbol. You should click this button to be able to see what exactly is separating the lines.
Our tips on MS-Word make your life easier and increase your productivity at work.
If lines are breaking because of paragraph break then ¶ will appear at the end of the lines. If lines are breaking due to line break (carriage return), a left-angled arrow symbol will appear at the end. Let’s first see how to deal with paragraph break:
How to Remove / Replace Paragraph Break
- Open the Word document that you want to work on
- Press CTRL + H to bring up the Find and Replace box
- In the “Find what” box type ^p [this upward arrow character is called caret and is usually available on a number key]
- In “Replace with” box type a comma
- Click on Replace All button.
Thus all the paragraph breaks in you document will get replaced by a comma. You can use whatever character(s) you like in “Replace with” box. For example, if you want to replace every paragraph break with two paragraph breaks –then you should type ^p^p in “Replace with” box.
If you simply want to remove paragraph breaks; just leave the “Replace with” box blank. And you’ll get a monolithic chunk of text!
READ ALSO: How to find ant replace formatting
How to Remove / Replace Line Break, Carriage Return (Enter key)
Follow the same process as given above. Instead of finding paragraph sign (^p), now you should look for line break or carriage return sign (represented by ^l). Therefore, type ^l in “Find what” box and replace it something else (or with nothing).
NOTE: This article is part of my MS Word Guide. This guide solves your day to day MS Word problems. Easily!
So, this is how you can replace line breaks, paragraph breaks and carriage returns in MS Word document. Please le t me know if you have any questions about this topic. I will be glad to try and assist you. Thank you for using TechWelkin.
Please Note:
This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Word in Microsoft 365. If you are using an earlier version (Word 2003 or earlier), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for earlier versions of Word, click here: Searching for Paragraph Marks and Line Breaks.
Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated May 4, 2019)
This tip applies to Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Word in Microsoft 365
Word allows you to search not just for text, but also for special characters that normally do not print. Two of the most common characters you will find yourself searching for are paragraph marks and line breaks (sometimes called newline characters and inserted by pressing shift+enter). To search for these characters, follow these steps in Word 2007:
- Press Ctrl+F. Word displays the Find tab of the Find and Replace dialog box. (See Figure 1.)
- In the Find What box, enter the text for which you want to search. To search for a paragraph mark, enter ^p; to search for a line break, enter ^l. It is important to use a lowercase p or l.
- Set other searching parameters, as desired.
- Click on Find Next.
Figure 1. The Find tab of the Find and Replace dialog box.
If you are using Word 2010 or a later version, then the interface used for searching is different than in earlier versions of Word:
- Press Ctrl+F. Word displays the Navigation task pane at the left side of the screen.
- In the box at the top of the Navigation pane, enter the text for which you want to search. To search for a paragraph mark, enter ^p; to search for a line break, enter ^l. (It is important to use a lowercase p or l.) If there are not too many matches, Word displays them in the Navigation pane.
- Use the Next and Previous arrows, just to the right of the pane tabs, to navigate through what Word found.
WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training.
(Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.)
This tip (8699) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Word in Microsoft 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Word here: Searching for Paragraph Marks and Line Breaks.
Author Bio
With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. Learn more about Allen…
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Delete page breaks fast
Updated on December 10, 2020
What To Know
- Press Ctrl+Shift+8 to show section breaks. Place the cursor left of the break, and press Delete. Press Ctrl+Shift+8 again to hide.
- For find & replace, press Ctrl+H. Put ^p^p in Find, and Replace With ^p. Press Replace or Replace All.
This article explains how to remove remove extra breaks in Word documents using the find and replace tool or deleting them manually. Instructions in this article apply to Word for Microsoft 365, Word 2019, Word 2016, Word 2013, Word 2010, and Word for Mac.
Remove Line Breaks in Word: Show Section Breaks
A quick way to find section breaks is to show these breaks in the document.
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Go to the Home tab and, in the Paragraph group, select Show/Hide. Or, press Ctrl+* (or Ctrl+Shift+8).
In Word for Mac, go to the Home tab and select Show all nonprinting characters.
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All section breaks become visible in the document.
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Place the cursor to the left of break you want to remove, then press Delete.
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Select Show/Hide to hide the section breaks.
Remove Line Breaks in Word Using Find and Replace
Use the Find and Replace tool to delete extra breaks in a document.
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Go to the Home tab and, in the Editing group, select Replace. Or, press Ctrl+H to open the Find and Replace dialog box.
In Word for Mac, use the Search box in the upper-right corner of the document.
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In the Find what text box, enter ^p^p (the letter p must be lower case).
In Word for Mac, go to the Search box and enter ^p^p.
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In the Replace with text box, enter ^p.
In Word for Mac, select the magnifying glass, then select Replace. In the Replace With text box, enter ^p.
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Select Replace All or Replace. Or, to view the breaks before deleting them, select Find Next.
This replaces two paragraph breaks with one. You can specify other options, depending on the number of paragraph breaks between paragraphs. You can also replace a paragraph break with another character.
Remove Line Breaks in Word Containing HTML
If you copied the text from the internet, this might not work for you. That’s because there are different types of breaks in HTML files.
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Press Ctrl+H.
In Word for Mac, use the Search box in the upper-right corner of the document.
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In the Find and Replace dialog box, go to the Find what text box and enter ^l (the lowercase letter L).
In Word for Mac, go to the Search box and enter ^l.
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In the Replace With text box, enter ^p.
In Word for Mac, select the magnifying glass, and then select Replace. In the Replace With text box, enter ^p.
-
Select Replace All or Replace. To view the breaks before deleting them, select Find Next.
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Microsoft Word belongs to Microsoft 365 and significantly simplifies the workday for those that work with text-based documents on a regular basis. One of the reasons for its popularity is its variety of options for formatting text. One thing that’s especially practical is the fact that Word automatically takes care of many of these formatting challenges. Among these is the insertion of an automatic link break in Word when a word goes beyond a provided line length.
In many cases it can make sense to insert a line break manually to improve the document’s overall structure. We’ll explain the differences between a soft and a hard line break (also called a return) and how you can apply both types of line breaks to structure your document. Do you work with Microsoft Word regularly? Our guide provides many more helpful articles on topics like Word macros and instructions on how to combine Word documents.
Contents
- What is a line break?
- How do you insert a line break in Word?
- Example: manual line break in Word with bullet points
- Example: manual line break in Word with justified paragraphs
- Making line breaks visible in Word
What is a line break?
The text editing program Microsoft Word offers lots of options when it comes to formatting text: such as defining the font size, line spacing, and text alignment. In addition, there are so-called spacing settings, such as the space before and after a paragraph. To start a new line within a paragraph, you can insert a line break in Word. This lets you jump to the next line, without having to change the set paragraph formatting or starting a new bullet point.
How do you insert a line break in Word?
By pressing the Enter key, you can achieve a hard return and start a new paragraph in Microsoft Word. This is probably the most used break. One that’s less common, though, is the manual line break in Word, which can be achieved by pressing down the right key combination. Using the Enter + Shift keys generates a so-called soft return. In doing so, you move to the next line while maintaining the defined formatting.
Tip
The key combination also works in other common text editing programs, as well as on different internet sites that have text and format fields.
Example: manual line break in Word with bullet points
Bullet points are a popular means of clearly structuring long sections of text and summarizing related information into a single point. However, a clear structure is also recommended within a bullet point, especially if a point covers several lines. With a manual line break in Word, a section can be clearly structured with breaks and blank lines. In this example, those places where manual line breaks are inserted are marked. Only in the case of a hard return or a new paragraph is a new bullet point inserted.
Example: manual line break in Word with justified paragraphs
If you are justifying text in Word, then you’re probably very familiar with the following problem: when you insert a manual line break at the end of a paragraph, Word stretches the last sentence over the entire width of the page. Due to the wide spacing, the text looks “patchy” and is difficult to read.
Luckily, this problem can be easily avoided. At the end of the sentence, press the Tab key and then then insert the manual line break in Word by using the key combination [Enter] + [Shift]. This will avoid Word from stretching out the sentence.
Making line breaks visible in Word
Formatting options such as font size or font color are obvious in a document. In contrast, it’s not immediately apparent whether a hard or soft return has been inserted in Word. For this purpose, the word processing program offers a practical function to highlight this kind of “invisible” formatting. To do this, activate the formatting characters.
Select the “Start” tab from the main menu and click the “¶” symbol in the “Paragraph” section. Alternatively, the function can also be activated or deactivated with the key combination [CTRL] + [Shift] + [+]. Up to version 2003 in Word, the feature to activate paragraph formatting characters is located on the standard toolbar. After clicking on it, Word marks all inserted line breaks as follows:
- The ¶ symbol marks all hard returns or paragraphs.
- A corner arrow marks a soft return in Word.
It’s not necessary to deactivate this function before printing a document since the formatting characters – as displayed on the print preview – are not printed on the final document.
Besides Microsoft Word there are also other programs like PowerPoint and Excel that are a part of Microsoft 365. Our Digital Guide is packed full of articles on topics like line breaks in PowerPoint and wrapping text in Excel.
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With Microsoft 365 you’ll have access to the entire suite of Office programs, including Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel und Outlook.
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How to turn spell check on and off in Word
In this guide, you’ll learn how to turn spell check on and off in Word. If you want to check your spelling in Word, you can set the application to automatically display misspelled words and grammatical errors. Word can also suggest corrections, which you can accept or ignore. You can show or hide these highlighted errors at any time.
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