Stopping Row Breaking for Many Tables

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated March 5, 2022)
This tip applies to Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, and Word in Microsoft 365

When working with tables, you may not want the individual rows in the table to break across pages. In other words, you want everything in each row to be on the same page. This is easy enough to do manually—you just adjust the table properties in this manner:

Select the row (or rows) you want to affect.
Display the Layout tab of the ribbon.
Click the Properties tool in the Table group. Word displays the Table Properties dialog box.
Make sure the Row tab is selected. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1. The Row tab of the Table Properties dialog box.

Clear the Allow Row to Break Across Pages option.
Click OK.

Now each row will stay on its own page. The table will still break across pages, but individual rows in the table will not.

While this seems easy enough, it can be tiresome to go through this same process for lots of tables in a document. For example, if you have 50 tables, then you'd have to go through the above steps 50 times. Argh!

The answer is to use a macro to change the Allow Row to Break Across Pages setting for all the tables. The following will do the trick:

Sub StopRowBreaking()
    Dim tbl As Table

    For Each tbl In ActiveDocument.Tables
        tbl.Rows.AllowBreakAcrossPages = False
    Next
    Set tbl = Nothing
End Sub

The macro works because it steps through each table and clears the setting (the AllowBreakAcrossPages property) for all the table's rows as a group. It is very quick, even if you have 50 or more tables in your document.

Note:

If you would like to know how to use the macros described on this page (or on any other page on the WordTips sites), I've prepared a special page that includes helpful information. Click here to open that special page in a new browser tab.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (13339) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, and Word in Microsoft 365.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. Learn more about Allen...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Turning Off Document Protection

If you protect your document using the tools that Word provides, at some time you may need to turn off that protection. ...

Discover More

Toggling Font Assignments in a Macro

If you need to quickly switch a text selection from one typeface to another, one way you can do it is with a macro. This ...

Discover More

Running Macros from Macros

Need to run one macro from within another macro? You can easily do it by using the Run method of the Application object, ...

Discover More

Create Custom Apps with VBA! Discover how to extend the capabilities of Office 365 applications with VBA programming. Written in clear terms and understandable language, the book includes systematic tutorials and contains both intermediate and advanced content for experienced VB developers. Designed to be comprehensive, the book addresses not just one Office application, but the entire Office suite. Check out Mastering VBA for Microsoft Office 365 today!

More WordTips (ribbon)

Indenting a Table

Insert a table into your document and it normally appears aligned with the left margin. Word allows you to indent the ...

Discover More

Last-Row Border Formatting

When the last row displayed on a page doesn't show the borders you want, it can be confusing to figure out how to get ...

Discover More

Centering Information in Table Cells

One of the most common ways to format information in a table is to apply some sort of alignment to the contents of table ...

Discover More

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

Notify me about new comments ONLY FOR THIS TIP

Notify me about new comments ANYWHERE ON THIS SITE

Hide my email address

What is 6 + 6?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)

This Site

Got a version of Word that uses the ribbon interface (Word 2007 or later)? This site is for you! If you use an earlier version of Word, visit our WordTips site focusing on the menu interface.