Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Word in Microsoft 365. 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: Editing a Hyperlink.
Once a hyperlink is placed in your document, it is not unusual to periodically need to change the link in some way. This is quite easy to do, using any of the following methods:
At the conclusion of either of these approaches, the Edit Hyperlink dialog box is visible. (See Figure 1.) The difference between this instance and actually adding a hyperlink is that all the information in the dialog box is already filled in. You can make edits to your heart's content, and then click on OK to save your changes.
Figure 1. The Edit Hyperlink 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 (11670) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Word in Microsoft 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Word here: Editing a Hyperlink.
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2018-08-08 17:56:50
Heather
What a great site you have! One question. For years, I've been telling the editors I work with that, when you want to edit the display text of a hyperlink that's already been inserted, you can't just delete or add characters--you have to right-click and choose Edit Hyperlink and then change the text of the "Text to display" field. This is what I was taught, but I realize I don't know why. Does anything bad happen if you don't do this and just type your changes instead? I'm sure my colleagues would like an end to this convoluted process, as well as my nagging. (Most of us work in Word 2016.)
Last time I looked this up in Microsoft help, the instructions still said to follow my processs but didn't say why. But today I found https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/291182/frequently-asked-questions-about-hyperlinks-in-word, which seems to say (under "How do I change the display text or image of a hyperlink after it has been created?") that I've been wrong. Can you corroborate that? Thank you!
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Please Note:
This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Word in Microsoft 365. 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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