How to delete an empty page in Word
Empty pages in Microsoft Word documents and compatible editors are highly undesirable. It's one thing when a document is used for personal purposes only, but it's another when other people will be viewing the information in the document.
This problem needs to be fixed - to do this, we will determine the cause of the empty pages, and based on that, we will establish a methodology for solving the problem.
Manual deletion
The first thing to do when empty pages appear is to try to fix the situation by manually deleting them - select the empty area or unnecessary part with text using the mouse and delete it by pressing the "DELETE" or "BackSpace" key.
If the page was added due to a break or because of a paragraph, then press the "Ctrl+End" key combination. This will automatically go to the end of the document. Then press "BackSpace". If multiple empty paragraphs have been created, leading to the appearance of an empty page, press "BackSpace" several times.
If the described options did not help, then move on to studying other methods below.
Appearance of Empty Pages and Solutions
The most common cause of empty pages and blank spaces in an existing document is paragraphs or invisible characters. This option is suitable for Microsoft Word 2003, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016.
To enable the paragraph sign, you need to:
- click on the special paragraph symbol "¶" on the toolbar, in the "Home" tab. It is located in the text formatting section;
- an alternative way to enable it is to use the "Ctrl+Shift+8" key combination.
As a result, in every place on the page where a paragraph is present, the corresponding "¶" sign will be displayed. Go to the last empty line and delete one or more empty paragraphs by pressing the "BackSpace" key. You can use the left mouse button to select.
How to Delete a Page Break
In some cases, an empty page may appear due to a break added accidentally using the "Ctrl+Enter" combination.
To delete the page when there is a break, do the following:
- click in the place before the "Page Break";
- delete using the "Delete" key.
Appearance of Section Breaks
Sometimes an empty page appears due to the automatic insertion of section breaks. They can be set in the "Layout" tab, "Breaks" option, under the "Section Breaks" subsection. The default should be "Next Page".
To remove the page in this case, place the cursor before the section break, and press "Delete".
Preserving Formatting after Removing a Break
Deleting a break in the text disrupts the formatting of the document and creates a new page, as the parts of the text "before" and "after" the break have certain formatting properties.
To preserve it, you need to:
- Click after the section break that will be deleted.
- Go to the "Layout" tab at the top of the program.
- Click on the icon next to "Page Setup" represented by an arrow pointing down at 45º.
- Go to the "Paper Source" section and in the "Section Start" option, select "On this page".
- Confirm the changes by clicking the "OK" button.
Deleting a Page after a Table
If there is a table at the bottom of the page with text and an empty page is created as a result of the appearance of a non-printable character, do the following:
- Enable the display of hidden characters by pressing "Ctrl+Shift+8", if it has not been done before.
- Select the character after the table by holding down the mouse button.
- Set the font size to "01".
The non-printable character becomes very small and the page disappears, but this technique is too rudimentary, so we recommend a second solution. Select the "¶" symbol using the mouse. Go to the font settings by pressing the "Ctrl+D" combination. In the first "Font" tab, under the "Effects" subsection, check the "Hidden" box, and confirm by clicking the "OK" button. After that, turn off the display of paragraph marks by pressing the "Ctrl+Shift+8" combination or by using the corresponding icon on the toolbar.
Empty Page at the Beginning of the Document
It occurs when an empty page appears at the beginning of the document, and the table of contents or the actual text starts after it.
To remove it, follow these steps:
- Go to "Find and Replace" by pressing "Ctrl+G".
- Go to the third "Go To" tab.
- In the "Enter page number" field, enter "\page" without quotes.
- Confirm by clicking "Go To".
- The formatting marks on the first empty page will be highlighted.
- Press "Delete".
Empty Page Inside the Document
The method for deleting an empty page inside a document with text is chosen based on the reason for its appearance. If it was caused by accidentally pressing "Enter" or in case of a mechanical input device problem, enable the display of paragraphs by pressing the "Ctrl+Shift+8" combination, select the paragraphs, and press "Delete".
If it was caused by a page or section break, use the respective method described in the above sections.
If the Empty Page Cannot be Deleted
A personal computer is a complex device, and errors can occur in the operating system while working with Microsoft Word. Try closing the editor and restarting the device. If all the methods described above did not help and restarting also did not solve the problem, then the only reason left is page numbering.
To remove it, do the following:
- Go to the end of the empty page.
- Select the number that represents the page numbering.
- Press the "Delete" key.
- Click on the sheet or press the "Close Header and Footer" button on the toolbar.
- Delete the page manually.
These are essentially all the available methods that will help most Microsoft Word users. If none of the presented methods help in your particular case, describe the problem in the comments - we will try to understand and find a solution.
