Tables are often used to display all sorts of information in a document. If you remove the borders of a table, however, it can be difficult to see where the table is located and where the edges of each cell are. For these instances, Word allows you to display gridlines around the table. The purpose of these gridlines is to mark the boundaries of the table and each cell in the table when you have the table formatted for no border.
You can turn gridlines on by placing the insertion point within a table and then displaying the Layout tab of the ribbon. In the Table group click the View Gridlines tool. When you later want to turn gridlines off, again follow the same steps.
It should be noted that you may not see any visible difference in the appearance of your tables when you turn the gridlines on or off. The reason is simple—tables, by default, have borders turned on, and the borders obscure the gridlines that Word may display. To see the gridlines, you'll want to remove any border from your table.
The gridlines setting is not set on a per-table basis. In other words, if you turn the gridlines off anywhere in a document (in or out of a table), it is turned off throughout the entire document.
WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (6038) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, and 2013.
Do More in Less Time! Are you ready to harness the full power of Word 2013 to create professional documents? In this comprehensive guide you'll learn the skills and techniques for efficiently building the documents you need for your professional and your personal life. Check out Word 2013 In Depth today!
When you print a table that includes borders, those borders should be crisp and clear on the printout. If you get some ...
Discover MoreExcel makes it very easy to add sequential numbers to a range of cells. Not so in Word's tables, where adding such ...
Discover MoreNeed to jump from one end of a table row to another? Word provides a couple of handy shortcuts that can make this type of ...
Discover MoreFREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."
There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)
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.
FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."
Copyright © 2019 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.
Comments