Aligning text vertically in Microsoft Word allows you to center or position text between the top and bottom margins of the page. This can be useful for creating title pages, headers, footers, and other special formatting effects.
Follow these simple steps to align text vertically in Word:
1. Select the Text You Want to Align
First, highlight the text that you want to align vertically. You can select a single word, sentence, paragraph or multiple paragraphs.
Select text in Word
Tip: To select all text from a certain point forward, simply click and place your cursor where you want the vertical alignment to begin.
2. Open the Page Setup Dialog Box
Go to the Layout tab on the ribbon and click the Page Setup Dialog Box Launcher icon. This is the small arrow icon in the bottom-right corner of the Page Setup section.
Page setup dialog box launcher
Alternatively, you can right-click anywhere on the page and select Page Setup from the context menu.
3. Go to the Layout Tab
In the Page Setup dialog box, click on the Layout tab.
Layout tab in dialog box
4. Choose a Vertical Alignment
In the Page section, click the drop-down menu next to Vertical alignment and select an alignment option:
- Top: Aligns text with the top margin
- Center: Aligns text vertically centered between margins
- Justify: Aligns text evenly between margins
- Bottom: Aligns text with the bottom margin
Vertical alignment options
5. Apply to All or Selected Text
In the Apply to section, choose whether you want the vertical alignment to apply to:
- The Whole document
- The text from a certain point forward (This point forward)
- Only the Selected text
Apply vertical alignment
6. Click OK
Click OK to apply the vertical text alignment. The text will now be aligned between the top and bottom margins as specified.
That’s it! You have now aligned text vertically in Word.
Tips for Aligning Text Vertically
Here are some additional tips when working with vertical text alignment in Word:
- To remove vertical alignment, simply repeat the steps and choose Top under the Vertical alignment options.
- For the alignment to take effect, there needs to be enough text to extend between margins. Try adding more text if you don’t see a change.
- You can also align text horizontally by going to the Home tab and clicking the alignment icons.
- Use headings and styles to divide your document into sections instead of manual vertical alignment.
- For more advanced page layouts, use text boxes, columns, and section breaks to control alignment.
When to Use Vertical Text Alignment
Aligning text vertically can help enhance readability and make certain text stand out in your document. Here are some examples of when to align text vertically:
Centered Titles and Headings
Center align titles, subtitles, and headings between the top and bottom margins to make them prominent.
Centered heading
Sidebar Text
If creating a sidebar, align the text to the top or bottom margin to differentiate it from body text.
Sidebar text
Text Next to Images
Consider center aligning text that appears alongside images so that it lines up.
Image caption
Pull Quotes
Pull quotes excerpted from the document can be centered between margins for emphasis.
Pull quote
So experiment with vertical alignment to make parts of your Word documents stand out!
