Replacing Just in the Footnotes

Gary uses Word's Find and Replace capabilities all the time in his editing. Now he's working on a document that has extensive footnotes, and he needs to make replacements within those footnotes. He is wondering if there is a way to limit Find and Replace so it only makes replacements in the footnotes instead of in other parts of the document.

There are actually a few ways you can do this. I'll cover each of the techniques in the following sections. As always, you can choose the technique that best fits with your approach to editing.

Using Both Find and Replace

It is possible to limit Find and Replace to just working in the footnotes if you utilize both the Find and Replace tabs in setting up what you want to do. This is because Word only allows you to make limits on where to search when using the Find tab of the Find and Replace dialog box. Follow these steps:

1. Press Ctrl+H. Word displays the Replace tab of the Find and Replace dialog box.
2. Switch over to the Find tab of the dialog box.
3. In the Find What box, specify the text you want to find.
4. Click the Find In button and choose Footnotes. (There will not be a "Footnotes" option if you don't have any footnotes in the current document.)
5. Switch over to the Replace tab of the dialog box.
6. In the Replace With box, specify the text you want to use in your replacement.
7. If you want to specify additional criteria for your replacement, use the other controls in the dialog box to do so. (You may need to click the More button, if available, to see all the other controls.)
8. Click Replace All to make all changes at once, or click Find Next to step through the changes individually.

The key to this approach is step 4. This is how you limit the replacements to just the footnotes. It is odd that Word doesn't make the Find In button available on the Replace tab of the dialog box, but it is fortunate that any settings made on the Find tab carry over to the Replace tab.

Using Styles

Another approach is to utilize styles in your Find and Replace operation. This approach works because the default style applied to footnotes is called Footnote Text. Here's how you can utilize this approach:

1. Press Ctrl+H. Word displays the Replace tab of the Find and Replace dialog box.
2. In the Find What box, specify the text you want to find.
3. Click the More button if it is available. Word expands the Find and Replace dialog box.
4. Click the Format button at the bottom of the dialog box and choose Style. Word displays the Find Style dialog box.
5. From the styles listed in the dialog box, locate and click once on the Footnote Text style.
6. Click OK to close the Find Style dialog box. Your style selection appears just below the Find What box.
7. In the Replace With box, specify the text you want to use in your replacement.
8. If you want to specify additional criteria for your replacement, use the other controls in the dialog box to do so.
9. Click Replace All to make all changes at once, or click Find Next to step through the changes individually.

Since you are limiting the search to just text using the Footnote Text style (step 5), and that style is used only in the footnotes, then your Find and Replace operation should be limited to just the footnotes in the document.

You'll want to be a bit careful with this approach to Find and Replace, though. While Word uses the Footnote Text style for footnotes by default, is is possible for someone to change the styles used for individual footnotes. Thus, if you are not comfortable with styles and analyzing how they are used in a document, or you suspect that someone may have used other styles in the footnotes, then you may want to rely on one of the other approaches described in this tip.

Using Views

The third approach is to modify which document view you use to do your Find and Replace operation. Follow these steps:

1. Display the View tab of the ribbon.
2. In the Views group (left side of the ribbon), click on Draft. Word displays your document in Draft view.
3. Display the References tab of the ribbon.
4. In the Footnotes group, click on Show Notes. Word displays the Footnotes pane just below the document and places the insertion point within that pane.
5. Press Ctrl+H. Word displays the Replace tab of the Find and Replace dialog box.
6. In the Find What box, specify the text you want to find.
7. In the Replace With box, specify the text you want to use in your replacement.
8. If you want to specify additional criteria for your replacement, use the other controls in the dialog box to do so. (You may need to click the More button, if available, to see all the other controls.)
9. Click Replace All to make all changes at once, or click Find Next to step through the changes individually.

This approach works because the insertion point is in the Footnotes pane (step 4), and any edits you make are limited to what is displayed in that pane. Once you are done, you can switch your view back to Print Layout, if you desire.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (7482) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, 2024, and Word in Microsoft 365.