Word includes a sometimes-helpful little feature that allows you to add lines in your documents, without removing your fingers from the keyboard. All you need to do is start at the left margin of a new line, type at least three characters, and then press Enter. The result is a line based on the characters you typed. You can use the following characters:
You can actually type more than three of each character, if you desire. Word doesn't care that much—the only requirement is that there is at least three of them, and they begin at the left margin. What Word does is to add a border of the specified type to the bottom of the paragraph. If you want to later delete the line, the only way to do so is to remove the paragraph, or choose Borders and Shading from the Format menu.
If you can't automatically add lines on your system, follow these steps:
Figure 1. The AutoFormat As You Type tab of the AutoCorrect dialog box.
WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (6095) 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: Adding Automatic Lines.
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2022-02-26 19:28:01
Kooh
Thanks! Nowhere else I found what i was looking for but here!
2020-05-23 12:45:53
Mimi
You are a life saver!
2020-04-19 07:28:34
John Mann
Worked for me in Word2010 running in Window 10. It aooears, though, that only a limited set of characters work this way. Reading the opening description seemed to allow any characters to be used, so my fist attempt was to make a line of xxxx. Enter simply started a new paragraph. The 4 characters Allen mentioned did indeed work. When I tried a few others that might conceivably be used to form a line, e.g. period or comma, no joy.
Still, I nice trick to read about.
2018-01-17 14:59:55
Terrell
This doesn't work. Tried it, is there another box that needs checking aside from border lines?
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