Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, and 2013. 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: Inserting the Date and Time.
Undoubtedly, the time will arise when you need to insert the current date or time in your document. This may be in the introduction of a letter or in a header or footer. Word allows you to quickly insert the date or time in several different formats. This information is inserted as a field which can be updated manually or is updated automatically when you print the document.
To insert the date or time into your document, follow these steps:
Figure 1. The Date and Time 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 (10513) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, and 2013. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Word here: Inserting the Date and Time.
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2015-03-29 19:20:53
Phil Reinemann
In my footer I often put the field for the last saved date. I'd prefer this to be easier than navigating through the list of field to get to the format I want so I really should create a macro in my template to do this, but just haven't gotten to it.
(Personally, I prefer a date format of YYYYMMDD HH:MM in 24 hour format. Stardate... ;-))
2015-03-28 10:29:20
Mike Brown
As a tech writer, our documents require I date the changes I make, which is always today's date in the mm/dd/yyyy format.
I recorded the following macro and attached it to a button in the toolbar so that I can simply click it and today's date is entered as text. (Search the web for specifying other date formats.) There are probably better ways to do this but this works for me.
Sub Date_short()
'
' Date_short Macro
'
'
Selection.Fields.Add Range:=Selection.Range, Type:=wdFieldEmpty, Text:= _
"DATE @ ""MM/dd/yyyy"" ", PreserveFormatting:=True
Selection.MoveLeft Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
Selection.Fields.Unlink
Selection.MoveRight Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
End Sub
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Please Note:
This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, and 2013. 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: 
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