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: Hyphenating Your Document.

Hyphenating Your Document

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated July 8, 2017)
This tip applies to Word 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016


1

Hyphenation is the process of adding hyphens to words at the beginning of lines so the hyphenated part will fit at the end of the previous line. The hyphens are inserted between syllables in a word. Word can automatically hyphenate your document for you, or you can use the hyphenation tool to manually hyphenate your document. To use the hyphenation tool, follow these steps:

  1. Go to the beginning of your document (this is not necessary, but saves time when hyphenating).
  2. Display the Layout tab of the ribbon. (In Word 2007 or Word 2010 select the Page Layout tab of the ribbon.)
  3. In the Page Setup group, click the Hyphenation tool. Word displays a series of choices.
  4. Select Hyphenation Options. Word displays the Hyphenation dialog box. (See Figure 1.)
  5. Figure 1. The Hyphenation dialog box.

  6. Use the controls in the dialog box to specify parameters of how the hyphenation is done.
  7. Select the Automatically Hyphenate Document check box if you want Word to make all the hyphenation decisions for you. When you subsequently click on OK, you can skip the rest of these steps.
  8. Click on the Manual button.
  9. You are shown the first possible hyphenation.
  10. If the word being proposed for hyphenation is long enough, you may be able to specify a different place for it to be hyphenated. Simply click on one of the proposed hyphenation points.
  11. Click on Yes to hyphenate the word at the noted point, or click on No to skip hyphenating the word. You are then shown the next possible hyphenation.
  12. Repeat steps 9 and 10 for the remainder of the 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 (6825) 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: Hyphenating Your Document.

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. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Changing Kerning

When you need to adjust the space Word uses between characters, you need to adjust what is called "kerning." This tip ...

Discover More

Renaming a Toolbar

Word allows you to create custom toolbars that can speed how you work with various tools and macros. When you first ...

Discover More

Adding a ScreenTip

If you want people to know something about a hyperlink you added to your worksheet, one way to help them is to use ...

Discover More

Comprehensive VBA Guide Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) is the language used for writing macros in all Office programs. This complete guide shows both professionals and novices how to master VBA in order to customize the entire Office suite for their needs. Check out Mastering VBA for Office 2010 today!

More WordTips (ribbon)

Multiple Document Users

If you have a group of people working on a single document, you may wonder what tools are available in Word to facilitate ...

Discover More

Inserting the Date and Time

Inserting a date and time in your document is a snap using the tools provided in Word. Just pick the command, then ...

Discover More

Generating a List of Dates

When creating tracking documents in Word, you may need to come up with a series of dates in the document. You can type ...

Discover More
Subscribe

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.

What is 2 + 5?

2023-08-31 08:26:39

Nils

When it comes to Manual hyphenation, it says in step 9 "Simply click on one of the proposed hyphenation points".

However, it is possible to click ANYWHERE in the word to make that the point of hyphenation, not having to select any of proposed hyphenation points (marked with "-").

For instance, it is possible to hyphenate "international" as inte-rnational instead of inter-national as suggested by Word.

Typing a soft hyphen in inte-rnational, when also having Automatic hyphenation enabled, might not give the desired result as Word seems to still include the default hyphenation-points at in-te(-)r-na-tion-al and hyphenate accordingly, without taking any special consideration to the useradded soft hyphen. For instance, if the space still allows for the r to be placed on the same line as "inte-", Word will move the r to the previous row and place the hyphen afterwards (as such: "inter-"), not giving the desired result.

In such cases, the Automatic hyphenation must be disabled, and one must use Manual hyphenation – or manually look through the document for lines that are too uneven or have too large gaps between the word, and manually hyphenate the words using soft hyphens.

In some languages, like Swedish, where Word's standard-choice of hyphenation may not be desired, depending on which hyphenation rule one wish to use (for instance in Swedish there are two hyphenation principles), this could be especially relevant.


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.

Videos
Subscribe

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

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.