How to remove large gaps in Word

Method #1

Aligning the text to the width of the page allows you to fill the entire width of the working area. This feature works well when there are enough words in a line, but in lines ending the last sentence of a paragraph, it can result in large gaps between words.

In other words, the first and last word will start and end at the edges of the page, and equal-sized spaces will be placed between words. If this option is not mandatory, we recommend disabling it and aligning the text of the document to the left.

To do this, you need to:

1. Select the document text by pressing “Ctrl + A”. If you need to select a portion of text on the page, use the left mouse button.
2. Go to the “Home” tab, “Paragraph” section on the toolbar, “Align Left” button.
3. The hotkey for left alignment is “Ctrl + L”.

Method #2

You can manually insert a space between words using the “Tab” key. In some versions of Microsoft Word, the default setting may be to use tabulation instead of regular spaces.

To check this, go to the “Home” tab, “Paragraph” section, and enable “Show hidden symbols”. If there is an “arrow pointing right” between adjacent words, it indicates a tabulation. You can remove it by placing the cursor after it and pressing the “Backspace” key.

If you need to remove multiple such spaces, you need to:

1. Select one of the spaces created by tabulation. Press “Ctrl + C” to copy it.
2. Next, press the combination “Ctrl + H” to bring up the “Find and Replace” window.
3. In the “Find:” field, paste the copied tabulation symbol using “Right-click -> Paste” or the combination “Ctrl + V”.
4. In the “Replace with:” field, press the space key.
5. Confirm the replacement by clicking the “Replace All” button. In the notification window, click “No”.
6. Close the windows and proceed to check the results of the replacement.

Method #3

The appearance of large gaps may be caused by a very simple reason - extra spaces inserted during typing and editing the text. How this happened is a separate question, but it happens. In MS Word, similar to errors, extra spaces can be highlighted, usually in quantities of 2-3. Unfortunately, a larger number will not be highlighted.

To fix several such spaces, you should enable the display of hidden symbols in the “Home” tab under the “Paragraph” section. Then, analyze the text, and in places where there are more than one space, delete the extra ones.

If you need to remove extra spaces throughout the document, you need to:

• Select the text or part of the text using “Ctrl + A” or the left mouse button respectively.
• In the “Home” tab, “Editing” section on the toolbar, click the “Replace” button.
• In the Replace window, press the space key twice in the “Find:” field, and once in the “Replace with:” field. Click the “Replace All” button.
• Repeat the same process for gaps of three spaces.

Method #4

The word wrap function is also a common cause of large gaps. To fix them without disabling it, you need to select the text using any convenient method, then click on the “Layout” tab, “Page Setup” section, and click on the “Hyphenation” button. In the dropdown menu, select the “Automatic” mode.

As a result, automatic hyphenation will appear at the end of lines where it is needed, and large gaps between words will disappear.

Method #5

When editing text, a special non-printable character is inserted at the end of each line. If it is the last line, the “Paragraph End” character will be inserted at the end. In normal display mode, it is not visible but can cause large gaps in the last line.

To remove it, enable the display of hidden symbols in the “Home” tab in the “Paragraph” section. Then, find this “arrow-shaped” symbol pointing downwards and to the left, and delete it using the “Delete” key.