This article was excerpted from Microsoft® Office Document Designer by Stephanie Krieger. Visit Microsoft Learning to buy this book and CD set, which includes the Microsoft Office Document Designer tool kit.

In this article

Introduction

The basics: What is a section break?

Types of section breaks

Keep an eye on your section breaks

Keyboard shortcuts

More information

 Note   If you're looking for the basics of how to edit page formatting, such as margins and page orientation, in your document — check out the article Understanding page (section) formatting before continuing here.

Introduction

Whether you've been frustrated by section breaks, or never heard of them, you've come to the right place! This article will give you simple, stress-free solutions for changing Section formatting within a document, and will also provide solace for those who have suffered the slings and arrows of Section formatting in the past. Working with Section formatting can be a cinch. But there is a catch: You have to understand a bit about how these little devils think.

Have you ever felt misunderstood? Well, that's how section breaks feel all the time! Contrary to popular belief, there is a logical reason for everything they do. Take a moment to understand where they're coming from and they'll repay your kindness by saving you time and tension in every document. If you've never used section breaks, learn what they are and how to insert them where appropriate. Need help getting in touch with your inner section break (or solving a Section formatting problem fast, before you throw your computer out the window)? Check out the tip table below, which provides quick answers to the most common section break quandaries.

 Top of Page

The basics: What is a section break?

You already use Section formatting in every document, even if you never touch the settings. Every document has page margins, a page orientation (portrait or landscape), a paper size, etc. But what happens when you want a different header and footer, different margins, or different orientation for just some pages of your document? You could place those pages in another file, then mess with the settings and page numbering to make it all appear as one document when it prints, but that's a hassle! And, it still does you no good if the document's being sent electronically. This is where section breaks are used to make things much more simple.

Section breaks exist to help you change page, or section, formatting within your document. A section break is just a formatting mark (similar to a paragraph mark) that stores the settings for all Section formatting up to that point in the document — so that you can change those settings from that point forward. Every Page Setup command (File menu) as well as page borders, headers and footers, page and footnote numbering, and text columns all use section breaks to change their settings for just part of a document.

 Note   Okay, if section breaks store formatting, then where's that formatting stored in a single-section document? Glad you asked! The last section of any document (or an entire single-section document) stores Section formatting inside the document's last paragraph mark. That's more than an obscure little Word factoid — that information can be important when troubleshooting misbehaving documents. Check out the tip sheet "Section Formatting Tips, Tricks, and Troubleshooting" (Microsoft Office Document Designer) for details.

Say, for example, that you're working on a report. At the end of the main body of text you need an appendix for several wide financial tables that will only fit on landscape pages. Here's what you do:

1. Place your insertion point at the bottom of the page immediately before your appendix.
2. Go to the Insert menu and click Break.
3. Select Next page under the heading Section break types in the Break dialog box and click OK.

   The section break you just inserted stores the portrait page orientation you've used to that point in the document. So, you can place your insertion point after that section break and change the page orientation to landscape for just the appendix pages. What's more, you selected Next page as the section break type because it contains a built-in page break that automatically starts your new formatting at the top of a new page.

 Top of Page

Types of section breaks

As you've seen in the Break dialog box, there are four types of section breaks: Next page, Continuous, Even page, and Odd page. That said, you might never have occasion to use any of them other than Next page, but it's a good idea to understand their different uses. All four types of section breaks store exactly the same type of formatting. The only difference is where your next section starts. Here's a quick summary of what you'll get with each section break type.

 Top of Page

Keep an eye on your section breaks

If you can't see your section breaks, turn on formatting marks by clicking the paragraph mark icon on the Standard toolbar . Section breaks can be difficult to see in print layout view even with formatting marks visible because they can fall at the end of a paragraph that contains text. Instead of embarking on a hopeless search for your section breaks, just check out your document in normal view, where section breaks always appear across the entire page. Take a look at the difference.

And, you can always check out the status bar at the bottom of your Word window to confirm the section you're currently working in or the number of sections in your document.

Now let's take a look at some common section break issues and how to make them work for you.

 Top of Page

Keyboard shortcuts

Here are some keyboard shortcuts to use when working with section breaks.

See the Keyboard shortcuts topic in Word Help for a complete list of available keyboard shortcuts for all features.

More information

You can find more cool tips and information for Word in Microsoft Office Document Designer. If you're comfortable with the basics of using section breaks, check out the next Section formatting article, "Word Documents from Top to Bottom: Making Headers and Footers That Work," in Microsoft Office Document Designer. Headers and footers can be a great help in your documents, and you might be surprised at just how much you can do with them.

About the author  Stephanie Krieger, a Microsoft Word MVP, is a professional consultant, trainer, and writer who specializes in creating solutions with the Microsoft Office System. She helps clients customize software and design templates and also provides train-the-trainer services.

 Top of Page