Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016. 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: Automatic Font Color Won't Print Properly.
Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated June 28, 2021)
This tip applies to Word 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016
Alan notes that his Word documents all come out blank when he prints them on the printer. The only way he can get them to print properly is to select all the text in the document, display the Font dialog box, and change the font color from Automatic to black. Alan is wondering why the Automatic color in Word results in invisible text when printing and how he can fix the problem.
There are two possibilities, and both of them have to do not with Word, but with your printer driver.
The first and most likely possibility is that you have a printer driver that has a glitch in it. You should make sure that you visit the Web site of your printer's manufacturer and see if there is an update available for the printer driver. If so, download it and install it to see if the problem goes away.
The second possibility is that the printer driver has some internal setting that results in the behavior you are seeing. Press Ctrl+P to display the Print dialog box (Word 2007) or the printing options on the File tab of the ribbon (Word 2010 and later versions). Click the Properties button (Word 2007) or the Printer Properties link (Word 2010 and later versions). The resulting dialog box allows you to explore the printer settings. Your printer driver controls all these settings, and you may discover one that is resulting in the behavior you note. This will require some trial-and-error poking about, so make sure that you have time to spend with the exploration.
WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (11673) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Word here: Automatic Font Color Won't Print Properly.
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2020-02-16 11:33:03
Brian
Correct: I went to Properties and noted that I had enabled the 'Print all text in black' in the Advanced section some time ago to print a shaper black and white image. I forgot to disable it but deselected and got color print from Word again. Thanks.
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Please Note:
This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016. 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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