Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016. If you are using an earlier version (Word 2003 or earlier), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for earlier versions of Word, click here: How Word Applies Styles.
Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated May 30, 2022)
This tip applies to Word 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016
If you work with styles quite a bit, you already know that the there are two types of styles you generally work with in a document: character styles and paragraph styles. (Word also allow you to define table and list styles, but they are not used as often as character and paragraph styles, and thus are beyond the scope of this tip.) As their names imply, character styles define how individual characters should appear, while paragraph styles are more comprehensive and define how entire paragraphs should appear.
Word includes quite a number of built-in styles that you can use for your documents. Some of these are defined as character styles, but the majority of them are paragraph styles. The general rules by which style application is governed are as follows:
WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (11623) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Word here: How Word Applies Styles.
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2022-06-01 06:18:44
Mike
How can you tell the difference between character styles and paragraph styles, as in the list?
2017-07-15 09:46:10
Paul Stregevsky
This hint is a keeper. But are you sure about number 6? I thought it depends on how much of the paragraph has already had character attributes or character styles applied.
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