Headings make text stand out and help people scan your document.
The simplest way to add headings is with heading styles. Using heading styles means you can also quickly build a table of contents, reorganize your document, and reformat its design without having to manually change each heading’s text.
-
Select the text you want to use as a heading.
-
On the Home tab, move the pointer over different headings in the Styles gallery. Notice as you pause over each style, your text will change so you can see how it will look in your document. Click the heading style you want to use.
If you don’t see the style that you want, click the More button
to expand the gallery.
to expand the gallery.Tip: You can change the font and formatting of a heading style. Just select the heading text you want to customize, modify its styles the way you want, and then on the Home tab, in the Styles group, right-click the heading style that you customized and click Update Heading to Match Selection. Every time you apply that heading style in your document, the heading style will include your customizations.
Styles can do a lot more, including a table of contents. Here’s a short video on why to write first and format later using Styles.
Headings can make text stand out and help people scan your document. The simplest way to add headings is to use heading styles.
-
Select the text you want to use as a heading.
-
On the Home tab, click the heading style you want to use.
If you don’t see the style you want, click a left, right, or down arrow to see more available styles.
This tutorial shows how to create headings in Microsoft Word. First, we’ll look at how to create headings using Word’s built-in styles. Then, we’ll look at how to customize Word’s built-in heading styles to your preferred font, font size, alignment, and color.
Table of Contents
- How to Create Headings Using Word’s Built-In Heading Styles
- How to Customize Word’s Built-In Heading Styles
Before jumping to the tutorial, let’s discuss the importance of using Word’s heading styles.
Why Are Heading Styles Important?
You can make any text in Word look like a heading by using a large font size. However, you won’t have access to several important features if you use a large font size rather than Word’s official heading styles. For example, Word’s heading styles help you perform the following tasks:
- Create an automatic or custom table of contents
- Create bookmarks in a PDF using Adobe Acrobat
- Use Word’s outline feature
- Use Word’s Navigation pane
Most importantly, screen reading software can identify your heading hierarchy based on Word’s styles. If you only use a large font size for headings, people who use screen readers will have less information about how your document is organized.*
This tutorial’s companion video shows 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. The steps are the same in Word for Microsoft 365 for Mac (a.k.a., Word for Mac), Word 2021, Word 2019, and Word 2016, and similar in Word 2013 (PC only).
How to Create Headings Using Word’s Built-In Heading Styles
The following steps show how to create headings using Word’s built-in styles.
- Select the text you want to turn into a heading. (Or, move your cursor to a blank line where you want to type your new heading during the next step.)
- Select the Home tab in the ribbon.
- Select the appropriate heading level in the Styles group. (If you didn’t select existing text during step 2, type your new heading text after making your selection.)
Pro Tip: Word includes nine heading levels, although only a few will appear in your Styles group when you open a new document. Additional heading levels will appear after you use higher-level headings. For example, Heading 3 will appear after you use Heading 2.
The selected text will be formatted with the new heading style immediately.
- Deselect the heading and then press Enter (PC) or Return (Mac) on your keyboard to move your cursor to the next line. The heading formatting will automatically turn off.
5. Save your file to save your new heading.
How to Customize Word’s Built-In Heading Styles
The following steps show how to customize the built-in heading styles in an individual Word document.
There are many ways to change styles in Word. For this tutorial, we’ll stick with the basics: font, font size, emphasis (i.e., bold, italic, or underlined), color, alignment, spacing, and indentation.
- Select the Home tab in the ribbon (see figure 1).
- Right-click (PC) or Control-click (Mac) the heading level in the Styles group, and then select Modify from the shortcut menu.
- Make all necessary formatting changes in the Modify Style dialog box. Here are the eight basic modifications:
A. Font
B. Font size
C. Emphasis
D. Font color
E. Alignment
F. Line spacing
G. Spacing before and after
H. Indentation
- (PC Users) Select Only in this document to ensure that your customized style is limited to your current document.
- (Mac Users) Ensure that Add to template is not selected to limit your customized style to your current document.
- Ensure that Automatically Update is not selected. (If Automatically Update is selected, you won’t be able to edit the styles of individual same-level headings.)
- Select the OK button.
Your changes will be applied to all existing text using the heading style you just customized.
- Save your file to save your changes.
Related Resources
How to Create Run-In Headings in Microsoft Word (Indented & Left-Aligned)
What Is Headline-Style Capitalization?
How to Capitalize Hyphenated Words in Titles and Headings
*Visit “Make Your Word Documents Accessible to People with Disabilities” from the Microsoft Office Support website for an in-depth list of ways to make your document accessible to the widest audience.
Updated March 18, 2023
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If you want to change the default Heading, Quote, Title, Subtitle, etc. font in Microsoft Word, you can follow this step by step guide. Just as it is for changing the default paragraph font in Office apps, this too is straightforward.
You can change the default font of Heading 1, Heading 2, Title, Subtitle, Subtitle Emphasis, Emphasis, Intense Emphasis, Strong, Quote, Intense Quote, Subtitle Reference, Intense Reference, Book Title, and List Paragraph. However, it is not possible to change all of them at once. You can apply different styles at different times by following the same method.
To change the default Heading, Quote, Title font in Word, follow these steps-
- Right-click on the Heading 1.
- Select Modify.
- Set the font family, font size, style, alignment, etc.
- Select New documents based on this template.
- Click the OK button.
Open up the Microsoft Word on your PC and right-click on any Style. In this case, we are going to use Heading 1. If so, you need to right-click on the Heading 1 and select the Modify option.
Alternatively, you can click the corner arrow icon in the Styles section. After that, select Heading 1 from the list, expand the respective drop-down menu, and select Modify option.
Now, you can change the style as per your needs. You can change the default font, font size, use bold/italic/underline, paragraph alignment, line spacing, etc.
After doing all these changes, you need to decide whether you want to apply the custom settings to the current document or all the future documents as well.
If you want to apply the custom style in all future documents, you need to choose New documents based on this template option and click the OK button.
After changing the default font and other things, if you want to apply this style to the current document, follow these steps.
Select the whole text to which you want to apply the custom style. Then, expand the Styles drop-down menu and select a style as per your needs. If you can find your style without expanding the list, there is no need to click the corresponding arrow button.
I hope this article will be helpful for you.
When he is not writing about Microsoft Windows or Office, Sudip likes to work with Photoshop. He has managed the front end and back end of many websites over the years. He is currently pursuing his Bachelor’s degree.
If you’re sick of MicroSoft word fonts Calibri and Cambria, change your default heading and body styles so you can start every new Word document with the fonts you prefer.
Put Font Frustration Behind You!
One of the most persistent frustrations legal users have with Microsoft Word fonts is the default font settings. Fortunately, you can permanently change just two Styles (+Body and +Headings) to give your documents a more businesslike typeface.
These settings are found in the Design tab (introduced into Microsoft Word with version 2013).
Over on the far right is a drop-down called Fonts. Clicking on Fonts will give you a list of preconfigured font sets. From here, you want to choose Customize Fonts.
That’s going to take you into the Create New Theme Fonts dialog box. On the left, you’ll see Heading font and Body font. This is where you set the two Styles I told you about earlier, +Body and +Headings, which in turn control basic settings for many of the other Styles in a Word document. Just use the drop-down for each to find a font more to your liking. Then you can name your preferred font set before clicking Save.
Once you reset the font style, the default text size is an easy fix, too.
Go to the Home tab and click on the small launcher arrow in the lower right-hand corner of the font section to go to the Font dialog box. Select +Body and the size text you want, then click Set as Default in the lower left-hand corner.
Word will ask whether you want to make this the default for this document only or for all future documents based on the Normal template. Choose the latter and click OK.
Save everything you’ve done by clicking Set as Default on the Design tab (next to the Colors and Fonts buttons).
Now Every New Document You Start in Word Will Use the Microsoft Office Fonts You Prefer
This doesn’t affect documents you receive from others or any existing documents you created. However, once you reset your default fonts, at least your days of adjusting the fonts every time you start a document are behind you.
Click here to read more of Deborah’s Microsoft Office tips.
Illustration ©iStockPhoto.com
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Apply and Customize Headings in Word Documents
by Avantix Learning Team | Updated April 19, 2022
Applies to: Microsoft® Word® 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021 or 365 (Windows)
You can create headings in Microsoft Word documents by applying Word’s built-in heading styles (such as Heading 1 or Heading 2). After you have applied styles, you can modify them and change the font, size, color, and other formatting attributes so the entire document will update. Once you have applied heading styles, you’ll be able to navigate to the headings using the Navigation Pane and create a table of contents.
Recommended article: How to Hide Comments in Word (or Display Them)
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Heading styles are very important because they create structure in your documents and are readable by screen readers or assistive technology programs used by people with vision impairments. They can also save you a lot of time formatting and reformatting documents.
In addition to creating structure, heading styles are also used to:
- Generate a table of contents
- Reformat a document using Style Sets
- Navigate using the Navigation Pane (select Navigation Pane on the View tab in the Ribbon)
- Rearrange a document using the Outline View
- Create a structured PDF (portable document format) file with heading tags
Note: Screenshots in this article are from Word 365 but are very similar in previous versions of Word.
Creating headings by applying Word heading styles
To create or designate headings, you will need to apply the built-in heading styles in order (Heading 1, Heading 2, Heading 3, and so) to paragraphs. There are 9 levels of headings available in Word.
Heading styles are technically available as paragraph and character styles, but it’s important to apply them as paragraph styles to entire paragraphs. A paragraph in Word is anything with a hard return after it (you have pressed Return or Enter).
Heading styles are affected by your theme choices (overall theme, color theme, and font theme). You can change theme options using the Design tab in the Ribbon.
To create headings by applying heading styles:
- Click in the paragraph (title or subheading) you want to designate or format as a heading.
- Click the Home tab in the Ribbon.
- Click the heading style you want in the Styles Gallery (such as Heading 1) in the Style group. You may need to click the More arrow on the bottom right of the Styles Gallery to view more styles and then click the style you want to use.
All available heading styles do not appear initially in the Styles Gallery. When you apply a heading level (such as Heading 3), an additional heading level should appear in the Gallery (such as Heading 4).
The Styles Gallery appears on the Home tab in the Ribbon and typically displays top level headings:
If you click the More arrow on the bottom right of the Styles Gallery, an expanded gallery appears:
Modifying or customizing heading styles using the Styles task pane
If you modify heading styles, every instance of the modified style will change in your document. Not only will this save time, but it will also ensure consistency. There are many ways to customize heading styles in Word. In this article, we will modify heading styles using the Styles task pane.
The Styles task pane appears with styles in the document (you can change this display by clicking Options at the bottom of the task pane):
To modify or customize a heading style:
- Click the Home tab in the Ribbon.
- Click the dialog box launcher (diagonal arrow) on the bottom right in the Styles group. You can also press Ctrl + Alt + Shift + S. The Styles task pane will appear. If the task pane is floating, double-click the title bar.
- Click in a paragraph using the style you want to modify.
- Click the arrow to the right of the heading you want to modify in the Styles task pane and then select Modify from the drop-down menu. You can also right-click the heading style in the task pane and select Modify. A dialog box appears.
- In the Modify Style dialog box, select the desired options such as font, font size, font color, alignment, and line spacing. Buttons in this dialog box are comparable to those in the Ribbon.
- If you want to change some other formatting options (such as paragraph formats), select Format at the bottom of the dialog box and select other options from the drop-down menu.
- Select Only in this document so that the style is modified in the current document only.
- Do not select Automatically Update unless you want the document styles to update when a user changes heading formatting in the document. It’s typically best to leave this option unchecked.
- Click OK or press Enter. The entire document will change unless a heading has been manually formatted (which overrides the style). You can simply reapply the style if this occurs.
The Modify Styles dialog box displays the style name, the type of style and options for modifying the style:
When you save the document, the modified styles are also saved.
Styles are the most important formatting feature in Word to automate formatting in longer documents. Heading styles also have the added benefit of creating structured documents and are integrated with several other Word features such as generated tables of contents.
This article was first published on May 15, 2021 and has been updated for clarity and content.
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