Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021. 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: Setting the Starting Line Number.

Setting the Starting Line Number

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated February 13, 2021)
This tip applies to Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021

If you are working on a very long document that uses line numbering, you may have stored parts of the document in different files. When you print those files, you don't want the line numbers to start over at 1 for each file you print. To adjust the starting line number for a document, follow these steps:

Display the Layout (Page Layout in older versions of Word) tab of the ribbon.
Click the Line Numbers tool (in the Page Setup group) and then choose Line Numbering Options. Word displays the Layout tab of the Page Setup dialog box. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1. The Layout tab of the Page Setup dialog box.

Click on the Line Numbers button. Word displays the Line Numbers dialog box. (See Figure 2.)

Figure 2. The Line Numbers dialog box.

Adjust the starting line number by changing the number in the Start At box.
Change the line number increment value (Count By) if desired.
Click on OK to close the Line Numbers dialog box.
Click on OK to close the Page Setup 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 (9257) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Word here: Setting the Starting Line Number.

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. Learn more about Allen...

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