Set up heading in word

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.

  1. Select the text you want to use as a heading.

  2. 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.

    The Styles gallery is on the Home tab

    If you don’t see the style that you want, click the More button More down arrow 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.

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Headings can make text stand out and help people scan your document. The simplest way to add headings is to use heading styles.

  1. Select the text you want to use as a heading.

  2. On the Home tab, click the heading style you want to use.

    Examples of Heading 1 and Heading 2 styles in a document

    If you don’t see the style you want, click a left, right, or down arrow to see more available styles.

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:

  1. Click in the paragraph (title or subheading) you want to designate or format as a heading.
  2. Click the Home tab in the Ribbon.
  3. 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:

Styles Gallery in a Word document.

If you click the More arrow on the bottom right of the Styles Gallery, an expanded gallery appears:

Expanded Styles Gallery in a Word document.

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):

Styles task pane in Word document.

To modify or customize a heading style:

  1. Click the Home tab in the Ribbon.
  2. 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.
  3. Click in a paragraph using the style you want to modify.
  4. 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.
  5. 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.
  6. 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.
  7. Select Only in this document so that the style is modified in the current document only.
  8. 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.
  9. 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:

Modify Styles dialog box in Word document.

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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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.

  1. 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.)

Selected text

Figure 1. Selected text
  1. Select the Home tab in the ribbon.

Home tab in Word 365

Figure 2. Home tab
  1. 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.)

Heading styles in the Home tab in Word 365

Figure 3. Heading styles

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.

Text with Heading 1 style applied in Word 365

Figure 4. Text with Heading 1 style
  1. 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.

  1. Select the Home tab in the ribbon (see figure 1).
  2. Right-click (PC) or Control-click (Mac) the heading level in the Styles group, and then select Modify from the shortcut menu.

Modify in the Heading style shortcut menu in Word 365

Figure 5. Modify option
  1. 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

Formatting options in the Modify Style dialog box in Word 365

Figure 6. Formatting options
  1. (PC Users) Select Only in this document to ensure that your customized style is limited to your current document.

"Only in this document" in the Modify Style dialog box in Word 365

Figure 7. Only in this document option
  1. (Mac Users) Ensure that Add to template is not selected to limit your customized style to your current document.

"Add to template" in the Modify Style dialog box in Word for Mac

Figure 8. Add to template option (Mac)
  1. 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.)

"Automatically update" in the Modify Style dialog box in Word 365

Figure 9. Automatically update option
  1. Select the OK button.

OK button in the Modify Style dialog box in Word 365

Figure 10. OK button

Your changes will be applied to all existing text using the heading style you just customized.

  1. 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

Not many people know there’s a quite useful feature in Microsoft Word that would help you organize long documents. It’s called heading — which basically makes the text stand out, especially for a title or specific section of your document.

It comes in a variety of styles which you can choose as you want. Not only that, the heading is also important to help people scan your document and reorder pages faster.

In some cases, headings could make your work easier. In fact, many companies are using headings on their documents because it’s more convenient to read and manage.

In this guide, I will assume you already have the text (line) that will be converted into a heading. Although the tutorial is based on Microsoft Word 365, the heading feature is available on all other versions.

1. Select the text you want to add as a heading.

Select - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 5

2. Go to the Home menu.

Home menu - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 7

3. Choose either Heading 1, Heading 2, or Heading 3.

select heading - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 9

4. Now, the text was converted into a heading.

heading - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 11

5. You can also change the font type, color, background color, and other styles.

change style of heading - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 13

If you go to View > Navigation Pane, you will see a new pane on the left showing all headings inside the document. You can jump into a certain section just by clicking the heading. Even better, you can drag & drop the heading and the section below it will automatically follow.

heading map - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 15

Creating a new style for a heading

The default heading style might not fit to your current document’s style. Luckily, you can create a new style and then use it when adding a heading in the future.

1. On the heading section, click the flipped triangle to expand options.

expand heading - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 17

2. Select Create a Style

create style - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 19

3. Give a name to your style, then click Modify…

modify - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 21

4. Adjust the settings based on your needs. Click OK to confirm.

OK - How to Quickly Add Heading in Microsoft Word 23

The new style will appear in the heading section. It’s just one click away to use it.

Headings are definitely useful for a document with tons of pages. Make sure you did not forget to add headings to your document.

How to Use Heading Styles in Microsoft Word

Style is essential to making a strong first impression. Admittedly, this usually applies to fashion rather than formatting. But in the academic realm, you’ll win more points for applying clear and consistent heading styles in a document than for wearing a fancy outfit.

Having said that, dressing like this when meeting your tutor will ensure they remember you. (Photo: Slava Zaitsev)

Having said that, dressing like this when meeting your tutor will ensure they remember you. (Photo: Slava Zaitsev)

And since a well-formatted document is vital for clarity as well as grabbing the reader’s attention, today we’re taking a look at how to apply heading styles in Microsoft Word.

Using Headings

The ‘Headings’ styles in Microsoft Word are formatting options for making headings and subheadings stand out from the other text in your essay. This will help your reader, particularly in longer essays, by clearly indicating where different sections begin and end.

Microsoft Word actually comes with a number of default heading styles (named ‘Heading 1’ through to ‘Heading 9’). You can use these as you find them, but you may also need to change them to fit with any specific requirements for headings set out in your style guide.

But how should you use these headings? Like so:

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  1. Go to the ‘Styles’ section of the ‘Home’ tab on the main ribbon
  2. Select the text you’re using as a heading and click on the appropriate ‘Heading’ style (e.g. ‘Heading 1’, ‘Heading 2’, etc.)Heading Styles
  3. If the required style is not visible in the ‘Styles’ tab, click the little arrow in the bottom right to open a side menu with further options
  4. If the required ‘Style’ still isn’t visible, click ‘Options…’ in the side menu and make sure ‘All styles’ is selected under ‘Select Styles to Show’, then click OKstyleoptions
  5. Once the correct heading styles show in the menu, select the text you want to format and apply each heading and subheading accordinglyBe sure to use different styles to distinguish between different ‘levels’ of heading, since the formatting style of chapter titles should be distinct from those used for section or subsection headings: e.g. use ‘Heading 1’ for the main headings, then ‘Heading 2’ for the next level down, and ‘Heading 3’ for subsections, etc., being careful to apply each style consistently.

Numbered Headings

If you want to use numbered headings, Microsoft Word’s multilevel list options are very useful. This will apply numbering to titles and subtitles whenever a ‘Heading’ style is used, thereby ensuring clear and consistent numbering for all headings in your document.
multilevelTo do this, you’ll need to:

  1. Apply different heading styles to your document for each level of heading
  2. Click on the ‘Multilevel List’ button in the ‘Paragraph’ section of the ‘Home’ tab
  3. Select one of the list styles that refers to headingslistoptions

This will apply a different numbering level to each heading style, while you can also modify and create multilevel list styles via the ‘Multilevel List’ menu.

This numbering will also update automatically if you add or remove headings, saving you the effort of re-numbering headings manually.

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