Many of us have at least once encountered Microsoft Word, and for newcomers, some of the features and tricks can be a challenge in the process of writing a document. Page break is one of the useful and at the same time can be an annoying feature in Microsoft Word.
In general, a page break is an invisible marker that allows you to separate one page of a document from another. In this way, you can put text on two different pages. During printing, the printer recognizes these invisible characters and takes them into account then prints the desired layout of the document.
To be more specific, there are two kinds of page breaks:
- The automatic page breaks occurs thanks to the program when you fill the entire page with content. So you can’t control it, but you can customize it
- Manual page breaks can still be controlled and added anywhere and anytime to make the right layout. You are in charge controlling manual page breaks because you are adding them yourselves.
How to add a page break
Learning how to add and use page breaks correctly will make your document work easier and more organized. Even from an aesthetic point of view, you can design the layout of the text, making it light and not overloaded.
To add page break manually in your document follow these steps:
- Place your cursor where you want one page to end and the next to begin
- In the Pages group go to Ribbon > Insert > Page Break
With the keyboard shortcut, you can also press Ctrl + Enter to quickly insert a page break.
To see where is the hidden page break click on Home > Paragraph Group > Show/Hide button in your document.
How to remove a page break in Word
So, you’ve figured out how to add page breaks in Word and customize your layout to your liking. But it’s also important to know how to remove unnecessary, annoying breaks.
Still you need to remember that page breaks are invisible non-printable characters and in order to carry out an operation on them, you need to find them.
Based on this information, you have the most primitive option how to remove page breaks from a Word document:
- Open your Word document
- Go to Home > click the Show/Hide button to see all hidden symbols like page breaks, spaces, and non-breaking spaces in the document
- Double-click to select a page break and press Delete to remove it
- As an alternative, instead of double-clicking, you can also place your cursor just before the page break symbol and tap Delete button on your keyboard
- After that you can click the Show/Hide button again to hide the other formatting marks in the document
Is there any way to go back? Sure, just press Ctrl+Z to undo your steps.
There is still another option to remove unnecessary page breaks. This method would come in handy when you wish to delete a bunch of page breaks in one go.
To start you need to:
- Press Ctrl+ H to open the Find and Replace window
- Choose the Replace tab, click on the Find what text bar and then hit the More button to open all the other options
- After that, click Special and choose Manual Page Break on the list
- In the end, leave the Replace bar blank and click Replace All to get rid of every page break in the document all at once with a blank space
Note: turn off Track Changes before deleting manual page breaks by pressing Ctrl + Shift + E.
How to control an automatic page breaks
As mentioned before, you can’t control automatic page breaks manually. But it’s very easy to customize it through Pagination. In this way, you can set up how Word will separate the paragraphs between the breaks and the spacing between them.
By doing so, follow these instructions:
- Go to the Pagination option and hit Ribbon > Home > Paragraph > Paragraph Settings (the tiny arrow icon) > Line and Page Breaks tab. In addition, you may just simply double-click anywhere on the page and select Paragraph from the list
- Select the paragraphs you want to make changes to
- Then select the desired settings from the list that appears
Why page breaks are so important
We should start with the fact that when we type text and do not think about the layout and in the process there are moments when you need to indent a lot of space or on the contrary move everything up, then it will cost us in the form of displaced images or other blocks of text in a completely unnecessary place.
To avoid all the hassle, use page breaks and you’ll be more comfortable formatting text when you need it.
