When you want to line up your text with the top, middle, or bottom of the page, align the text vertically (up and down) in Microsoft Word. This feature is helpful to create the correct alignment for a title page, or to add visual interest to any page or pages of a document.
Instructions in this article apply to Word 2019, 2016, 2013, 2010, 2007, 2003; and Word for Office 365.
Vertically Align Text in Word
When you want to position text in a section of a document relative to the top and bottom margins, use vertical alignment.
To reflect a change in vertical alignment, your page or pages must be only partially full of text.
For Microsoft Word 2019, 2016, 2013, 2010, and 2007
For Word 2003
To vertically align text in Microsoft Word 2003:
Vertically Align Part of a Word Document
When you use the steps above, the default condition is to change the vertical alignment of the entire Microsoft Word document. If you want to change the alignment of only part of the document, select the text you want to vertically align.
Here's how to vertically align part of a document:
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If you don't select text prior to performing the alignment selection, the Selected text preference can only be applied from the cursor's current location to the end of the document.
To make this work, position your cursor and then:
When creating a newsletter or brochure, a large block of text can be boring and even irritating to read. Instead, the text should run in space-saving and visually pleasing columns. Microsoft Word has a feature that allows you to create neat, uniform columns separated by a vertical white space, which can even include thin vertical lines for that sharp newspaper look.
Step 1
Save your Word document before making any changes. If some sections will need to have different numbers of columns (one through five), break the document into sections by choosing Insert>Break>Section Break Types>Continuous.
Step 2
Place the cursor in the section where you want to create columns. Click and drag to highlight the text you want to put into columns. From the standard toolbar, select the 'Columns' button, which looks like two little columns of text; alternatively, you can choose 'Format>Columns' from the drop-down menu at the top of the document window.
Step 3Microsoft Word Vertical Line In Margin
From the Standard toolbar, when you select the 'Columns' button, four little columns drop down. Drag to choose how many columns you want. From the drop-down menu, a Columns dialog box opens. Click to choose the number of columns you want, and then click 'OK.'
To add vertical lines between columns, you cannot use the Standard toolbar. Choose 'Format>Columns' from the drop-down menu at the upper left of the window and a dialog box will open. Select how many columns you want. Then click the 'line between' button, and hit 'OK.' A vertical line will appear between the columns.
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Word’s rulers let you control the margins of your page and the indentation of paragraphs. They’re great for precisely lining up images, text, and other elements. If you’re printing a document, the rulers can help ensure that what you see on your screen translates into what you’ll get on the printed page.
The trouble is, rulers aren’t even visible by default in Word anymore. Here’s how to turn them on, and how to make the most out of them.
Note: We’re working with Office 2016 in this article. The rulers have been around pretty much forever, though, and work similarly in previous versions of Word.
Activate the Rulers
First, make sure you’re in Print Layout view. On the Ribbon, switch to the “View” tab (all the way on the right). If “Print Layout” isn’t already highlighted, click it now.
Now look towards the center of the Ribbon. In the “Show” section, enable the “Rulers” option. You should immediately see the horizontal ruler above your document and the vertical ruler to its left.
Note: The horizontal ruler is also visible in Web Layout and Draft view. The vertical ruler is not.
Access the Page Setup Window
Double-click any empty space on the ruler to open the Page Setup window. This is the same window you can open from the Layout tab on the Ribbon.
The “Page Setup” window shows you most of the physical layout properties of the document. The “Margins” tab lets you set the margins for the top, bottom, left, and right, which you can verify with the markers on the ruler (see below). The Gutter is extra space on the page, usually used as an extra blank space for things like comb binding (those little plastic corkscrews that make a cheap notebook). It’s set as blank by default. You can also use this tab to control page orientation.
If you’re printing your document, the “Paper” tab lets you can change the physical size of the paper to match different paper sizes in your printer. The default is 8.5 inches by 11 inches, the standard “Letter” size for US paper printing (215.9 x 279.4mm). You can see the result of this setting in the digital rulers on the page, with the default 1-inch margins resulting in a 7.5-inch horizontal ruler and a 10-inch vertical ruler. If you’re planning on printing via a standard home printer or you’re using the primary tray in your office printer, leave this as is.
Change Margins On the Fly
Margins are indicated on the ruler by the gray and white areas. The gray areas at either end of the ruler represent your margin; the white areas the active page. The scaling of the rulers seems a little strange at first. It actually starts on the far left (or top for the vertical ruler) with a number indicating the size of your margin and then counts down. When it reaches the white, active area, it starts counting up again. You can see this in the image below, where I’ve set the margin to two inches.
We’re friends as long as we don’t tour together. Shane macgowan health. Anglotopia was founded by Jonathan and Jackie Thomas in 2007 in a closet in Chicago. We just got a bit sick of each other. I’ve had enough of it.” Let’s just hope they can put aside their differences for long enough to tour together again. I’ve done a hell of a lot of touring.
In Word’s default 8.5 by 11-inch page setup, the horizontal ruler starts at 1 (indicating a one-inch margin), then resets at zero where the margin ends, then counts up to 7.5 for the remaining horizontal space. Ditto for the vertical ruler: starts at one for a one-inch margin, restarts at zero at the white space, and only goes up to ten.
Note: Word’s rulers show whatever measurement you have set in File > Options > Advanced > Show Measurements In Units Of. You can change measurements to centimeters, millimeters, points, or picas. Be aware, though, that this settings controls the units of measurement used throughout Word—not just the ruler.
You can also quickly adjust margins right from the ruler. Hold your mouse over the line separating the white and gray area. You’ll see the pointer turn to a double arrow and will likely see a tooltip letting you know you’re point at the margin. Now, just click and drag that line left or right to adjust that margin.
Change Indents on the Fly
Those little triangle- and box-shaped markers on the ruler are quite handy. They control the indenting of individual paragraphs. Just position your cursor in the paragraph you want to adjust and slide them around. If you want to change multiple paragraphs, select the paragraphs you want to change. And if you want to change indents throughout the whole document, just hit Ctrl+A (to select everything), and then adjust the sliders.
Here’s how each indent works.
Dragging the Left Indent marker changes the indentation for all lines of a paragraph. As you slide it, the other two indent markers move as well. Here, I’m moving the Left Indent half an inch in from the left margin.
Dragging the First Line Indent marker changes indentation for only the first line of a paragraph.
Dragging the Hanging Indent marker changes the indentation of all lines except the first line.
On the right end of the ruler, you’ll find only one marker: the Right Indent marker. Drag it to constrain the paragraph on the right side.
Add Tab Stops
A tab stop is the location your cursor moves to when you hit the Tab key. A default Word document has no tab stops, so each time you hit the Tab key, the cursor jumps ahead about eight characters. Setting tab stops lets you better control and line up text.
Of course, Word offers enough options that things get a little more complicated than that. If you look all the way to the left edge of your document, just above the vertical ruler, you’ll see the Tab Stop button.
Clicking this button lets you cycle through the different types of tab stops Word makes available. Here they are:
A little tip for you. If you’re cycling through tab stops and don’t remember what each symbol means, move your mouse away from the button and then back to activate a tool tip describing that tab stop.
To insert a tab stop, just use the button to select the type of stop you want. Now, point your mouse anywhere on the white portion of the horizontal ruler (toward the bottom of the ruler line), and then click. A symbol appears indicating the type of tab stop you’ve placed. This is a tab marker, showing where the text will jump to if you press the Tab button on your keyboard.
Here’s an example. In this paragraph, the Left Indent is half an inch from the left margin, the First Line indent is another half inch further in, and I’ve set a tab stop at two inches. I pressed the Tab button with my cursor in front of “Lorem,” so the text jumped to my manually-set tab point.
Microsoft Word Vertical Line Won't Go Away
You can insert multiple tab markers if you want, and you can click and drag them around to reposition them on the fly.
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To get rid of a tab marker, just drag it down (away from the ruler) and release the mouse button.
And, if you prefer to set up your tab stops manually (and a little more precisely), double-click any tab marker to open the “Tabs” window.
The ruler is just one of the little features in Word that packs a whole lot more functionality than most people realize. It provides a quick way to control margins, set various indents for a paragraph, and keep things in line using tab stops. Why Word leaves it turned off by default is beyond us, but at least now you know how to turn it back on and put it to use.
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Is there a way to have a two-line page background watermark in Microsoft Word without using Word Art?
studiohack♦
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Jim FellJim Fell
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3 Answers
While you do need to use the 'Word Art' mode to insert line breaks into a watermark, this workaround does not have any real limitations. It's non-intuitive but it works fine.
From Microsoft MVP Stefan Blom
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Robert CalhounRobert Calhoun
There is no way to have a two-line page background watermark in Microsoft Word without using Word Art.
Jim FellJim Fell
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I believe that Stefan Blom's answer is generally correct, but his menu pick descriptions don't match well with what I see on Word 2013 under Windows 7.
I believe this procedure will be a little easier for others to follow on Word 2013, and adds quite a few useful explanations:
Related tips:
Big thanks to Stefan; his post sparked me to figure out what worked for me.
Why have I totally geeked out (obsessed?) on this?
Engineers in general, the American National Standards Institute (sets recommended engineering drafting standards in the U.S.), and my Fortune-50 employer in particular have all adapted to 1980s technology very poorly for producing formal engineering documents, even though it's now the 2010s. We go to a lot a trouble to reproduce document features that go back to Rapidograph pens, ChartPak lettering, and diazo printing machines (look 'em up, kids; they're in Wikipedia). Not only do these document artifacts contribute nothing, they often are very hard to produce using general-purpose software (which is one reason engineering software is so crazy overpriced - they can demand a princely price for doing silly stuff no other market cares about). The useless features I am reproducing are inward-facing arrows centered on all four sides of the pages of an otherwise-unexceptional (fancy footer with document information table excepted) document on Letter paper. The purpose of the these silly targeting arrows (and the associated outline box, which is easy with Page Borders) is to make things easy for the camera operator making archival microfilms. Never mind that we haven't archived to film in twenty-plus years, our configuration control system supposedly keeps the source Word doc forever, and our corporate engineering library definitely keeps a PDF forever .. I have to do this often enough that getting a proper template sorted pays. On good days, I might even share it with colleagues whom I like. I just wish my document checkers would believe me when I tell them that Jimmy Carter is no longer in office ..
John - a bad-tempered old fartJohn - a bad-tempered old fart
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I have a timeline of events in my CV, where each event is described by a single paragraph. Some paragraphs are logically enclosed by others (such as an internship during studies), which I want to symbolize by a vertical line on the left side.
Here's a sketch:
(Important note: The lines should be running through, not as bullets or blocks)
What's the best way to accomplish this?
I have tried:
I am trying to to this in Word, but I am also happy to use Latex.
Thanks for your input!
zuiqo
zuiqozuiqo
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1 Answer
My choice would be to use formatting styles for lists (outlining), e.g. Level1, Level2 etc. Set the format of the style as you want, with leader, color etc. to keep it consistent.
That said, most CV's and résumés are evaluated by PC applications before a person looks at them. Keep it simple to have the best chance of being forwarded top a human. [BTW, did you intern at SwearShop or at SweatShop? A hat in time wiki. It may be pedantic to criticize a humorous example, but any error on a real CV might cause HR to regard it negatively.]
DrMoishe PippikDrMoishe Pippik
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