Direction Arrows Confused

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated May 31, 2025)
This tip applies to Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, 2024, and Word in Microsoft 365


Pat reports that something really strange has happened with one of her documents. For some reason, the arrow keys have become confused. Pressing the Left Arrow moves the cursor right, while the Right Arrow goes left. Pat wonders why this would be happening all of a sudden and how she can fix it.

The first thing you'll want to do is to figure out if this is happening with just a single document. Open other documents on your system and see if the same problem exists there or not. If it is a single document, then check if the document contains two languages, one "left to right" and the other "right to left." For instance, if the document contains Hebrew or Arabic text, those are "right to left" languages, and within those languages pressing the Right Arrow will move the insertion point to the left and vice versa.

If it is a language issue, then Word is functioning just as it should. If it is not a language issue and the issue is with the single document, then there are only a limited number of reasons as to why it could be happening. The first thing to check is whether there are any macros associated with the document. It could be that the macros redefine the behavior of the arrow keys. If that is the case, then you can delete or edit the macros to make the behavior change.

The other possible cause is that the document is corrupted in some manner. Corrupt documents can display all sorts of strange behaviors, including keyboard quirks. If you suspect this is the case, then you'll need to go through some rather standard steps for dealing with corrupt documents. This WordTip can help in that regard:

https://wordribbon.tips.net/T013284

If the problem is exhibited on all documents on your system, then you need to take the documents and open them on a different system. If the problem is not evident on the other system, then you know the problem is probably hardware related on your system. You can verify that it is a hardware problem by checking to see if the arrow keeps misbehave in programs other than Word. If so, then shutting down your system and restarting. If that doesn't fix the issue, then shut it down again and swap out the keyboard for a new one to see if that takes care of the problem.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (11464) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, 2024, and Word in Microsoft 365.

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. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Moving Breaks Quickly

Breaks in a document can be easily moved from one place to another using familiar editing techniques. The trick is to ...

Discover More

Entering Tabs in a Table

When press the Tab key while entering info into a table, Word dutifully moves to the next table cell. If you don't want ...

Discover More

Upside-Down Printing

Putting words on the printed page is easy in Word. Rotating those words in different manners can be a bit trickier. This ...

Discover More

Do More in Less Time! An easy-to-understand guide to the more advanced features available in the Microsoft 365 version of Word. Enhance the quality of your documents and boost productivity in any field with this in-depth resource. Complete your Word-related tasks more efficiently as you unlock lesser-known tools and learn to quickly access the features you need. Check out Microsoft 365 Word For Professionals For Dummies today!

More WordTips (ribbon)

Avoiding the Update Links Message

Word allows you to establish links from one document to another. When you open a document containing these links, you may ...

Discover More

Quickly Changing Document Windows

When working with multiple documents at the same time, you often have a need to move from one document to another. Here's ...

Discover More

Inverting Colors in a Document

Visual impairments can present severe challenges in accessing information stored in a Word document. There are some ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is eight minus 8?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)


This Site

Got a version of Word that uses the ribbon interface (Word 2007 or later)? This site is for you! If you use an earlier version of Word, visit our WordTips site focusing on the menu interface.

Videos
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.