Copying and Moving Footnotes

Word implements a full-featured footnote system that allows you almost total control over where and how footnotes are printed. If you have previously inserted footnotes into your document and you want to duplicate a footnote, you can use techniques you already know for copying regular text. To copy a footnote, follow these steps:

1. Highlight the footnote reference mark in your document.
2. Press Ctrl+C. The footnote reference mark and the associated footnote are copied to the Clipboard.
3. Position the insertion point at the location where you want to copy the footnote.
4. Press Ctrl+V. The footnote reference mark is inserted in your document, and the associated footnote is added to the footnotes section. If you are using auto-numbered footnotes, all the footnotes in your document are renumbered.

If you instead want to move a footnote to another location in your document (or even in another document), you can use similar techniques. All you need to do is use Ctrl+X in step 2 instead of the noted Ctrl+C.

There is an important point to remember if you are copying, pasting, or moving footnotes in this way, and that has to do with Track Changes. If you have Track Changes turned on in the document, then copying, pasting, or moving footnotes results in an edit that is "tracked." The result is that your automatic footnote numbering can become messed up and seem all out of whack. Don't worry if this happens; when you resolve all the changes you've been tracking (either by accepting or rejecting them individually), the numbering will come back in whack and you'll be happy with the results.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (8874) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Word in Office 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Word here: Copying and Moving Footnotes.