Text going up and down in word

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An easy-to-follow guide on changing the direction of text in Microsoft Word

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Do you want to type vertically in word? You can create vertical text by creating a textbox and adjusting its settings to set the position. You can change the text’s direction, rotate it, and mirror it. You could also change the document’s orientation from portrait to landscape mode. This wikiHow will show you how to write vertically in word on your Windows or Mac computer.

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Article SummaryX

1. Click Insert.
2. Click Text.
3. Click Text Box.
4. Click Draw Text Box.
5. Click and drag a text box.
6. Type text into the box.
7. Hover the mouse over the box outline.
8. Click the rotation icon and drag in any direction.

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Contents

• 1 How to Rotate Text in Word
• 2 How to Mirror text in Word
• 3 How to Change Text Box Border and Shadow

You may have noticed that there’s no option to rotate text that you’ve typed directly into a Word document. This is because you need to create a textbox first, which will provide you with additional formatting and style options. We’ll run through the basics below.

1. Create a text box  

   Open the “Insert” tab in your Microsoft Word ribbon and then click “Text > Text Box”. Choose one of the built-in style options from the list. We’re going to use the Simple Text Box as it’s the closest to regular text. If you don’t have any text to add to it, you can one of Word’s random text generation tools.

   

2. How to quickly rotate text in Word  

   You can quickly rotate text in 90-degree increments by pressing selecting the text box and making sure “Shape Format” is the active ribbon tab. Press the right-angle triangle button at the right of the ribbon and select from one of the options to rotate words.

   You can rotate right left or right, as well as use the text flipper to flip text horizontally or vertically.

   

3. How to manually rotate a text box in Word  

   If you want to rotate your text box in Word to an angle that doesn’t divide by 90, you can instead use the rotation (?) icon above the box. 

   

4. Enjoy your rotated text  

   You may notice that your textbox has a border around it. We’ll show you how to fix that, as well as how to mirror text and apply a shadow, below.

   

The process to mirror text in Word is a little less intuitive, but still quite simple. In a few clicks, you can mirror text in the X, Y, or Z axis. Here’s how:

1. Open 3-D rotation options  

   With your text box selected, open the “Shape Format” tab. Press the text effects icon, which is an A with a blue border, and then hover over “3-D Rotation”. At the bottom of the 3-D rotation window, you’ll see text that reads “3-D rotation Options…”. Click it.

   

2. Mirror text by X, Y, or Z rotation  

   In the “3-D Rotation” drop-down, you can then type your mirror rotation in degrees in the X Rotation, Y Rotation, or Z Rotation boxes.

   You can type 180 in the X rotation field mirror your text horizontally, in the Y rotation to mirror the text upside down, or in the Z rotation box to flip the text.

   

You may have noticed that your text box has a black border by default which distracts the eyes from the text itself. Word lets you remove this or even add shadow to make the text stand out more. Here’s how you can achieve the effect:

1. How to remove a text box border in Microsoft Word  

   To remove a border in Word, click the text box and open the “Shape Format” tab. Then, click the pen icon, which should be somewhere in the middle, below the paint bucket.

   This will bring up the Theme Colors menu, where you can change it to your background color or select “No Outline” to get rid of it. Of course, you can also change the color and styling options if you so wish.

   

2. How to add shadow and other effects to a text box in Word  

   There are a few other effects you can apply to make your text box look more interesting. If you click the text box and then press the cuboid icon in the Shape Format tab, you can apply the following effects:

   • Shadow
   • Reflection
   • Glow
   • Soft Edges
   • Bevel
   • 3D rotation

   

3. Select your effects and enjoy  

   In just a couple of seconds, you can create something that looks a lot more unique.

   

Donatella Versace, Vice-President of the Versace Group, once noted that, «Creativity comes from a conflict of ideas.» Whether you are designing a building or creating a document, you can do it more creatively by incorporating elements that appear to conflict with their surroundings. For example, many people expect a Word document’s text to flow horizontally. Using a simple trick, you can disrupt that flow and introduce text that moves up and down the page vertically. Used sparingly, this effect can help a document stand out and capture the attention of people who read it.

1. Open a Word document.and click «Insert» followed by «Text Box.» The built-In window opens and displays different types of text boxes.

2. Click «Draw Vertical Text Box» and note that your cursor changes into a crosshair.

3. Click the location within the document where you want to insert vertical text, hold down your left mouse button and draw a vertical rectangle.

4. Release the mouse button to place a vertical text box on the document. Type any text in the text box, and Word makes the text flow from top to bottom.

5. Click the small handle that displays in the midpoint of the text box’s right side, hold down your left mouse button and drag the handle to the left to make the text box narrower. This eliminates the excess space that may surround your text.