Adding page numbers is a must for any long document, like reports, books or essays. It really helps to make your work easy to navigate. Let’s see how to get this done in Word.
Adding page numbers
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First, open the Word document you want to add page numbers to. If you’re starting a fresh one, just go ahead and create that.
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Head to the Insert tab. You’ll find it at the top of the Word window.
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Now, in the Insert tab, look for the Page Number option. Clicking it will display different page number placement options.
- A dropdown menu appears with various options. Choose where you want the page numbers to appear - top (header), bottom (footer), margins, or current cursor location. Pick the one that works best for your document.
- After choosing the style, your page numbers will appear automatically in the document where you placed them.
Now, let’s look at some tweaks.
Method 1: Excluding a number from the first page
If your document has a title page, or you simply don’t want a page number on the first page, here is how to remove it:
- Go to the Design tab under Header & Footer Tools.
- Find the Different First Page option and enable it. This will remove the number from the first page only, keeping the rest of the page numbers in place.
Method 2: Changing the numbering style
If you want to change the format of your page numbers:
- Open the Page Number dropdown menu again.
- Select Format Page Numbers.
- You can now change your numbering style - for example, use roman numerals (i, ii, iii) or letters (a, b, c). You can also set a specific page number to begin with.