Understanding "Through" Text Wrapping

Word includes several different ways that you can wrap text around pictures and other objects. Most of those wrapping methods are self-explanatory. There is one wrapping method—through wrapping—that may not make immediate sense.

The way that text is wrapped around an image depends on the wrapping points defined for the image. Wrapping points are nothing but a boundary that text cannot cross when it flows around the image. For many objects and images, the wrapping points define a rectangular box around the image. For other objects and images it may be more irregularly shaped. Consider the following image, which has the wrapping points displayed. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1. The wrapping points around an image.

These wrapping points define the boundaries of the image. If you specify tight wrapping for the image, then the text is wrapped as close as it can be to the exterior of the image, but no text goes "inside" the image. The following shows how this type of wrapping occurs. (See Figure 2.)

Figure 2. Tight wrapping around an image.

Through wrapping, however, is essentially the same as tight wrapping, except it allows text to wrap so that it fills holes within the image that are created by the path of the wrapping points. See, for instance, the same image with through wrapping applied, as shown in this figure. (See Figure 3.)

Figure 3. Through wrapping for an image.

For many objects there will be no functional difference between tight and through because the wrapping points define a path in which there are no holes. Perhaps the best example would be for text boxes or tables, which are rectangular items. There are no internal holes, so tight and through wrapping have the same result.

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