How to Delete an Unwanted Page in Microsoft Word

How to Delete an Unwanted Page in Microsoft Word

So there is a blank page either in the middle or at the end of your Word document that cannot seem to be deleted. This is a very common and often frustrating occurrence that many users face while creating content within Microsoft Word. Sure, you can choose to print only select pages, but that doesn’t exactly solve the problem.

Basic Solutions to Remove an Unwanted Page in Word

• Here is the most basic approach: Go to your unwanted blank page in your Word document, click as close to the bottom of the page as you can, and press your Backspace key until the page is removed.
• If that fails, try this: Click the "View" tab from the Ribbon and select (check) the Navigation Pane in the "Show" section. Now, click on Pages, and select the blank page thumbnail in the left panel. Press your Delete key until it is removed.

• If that doesn't work either, double check your Sections: Click the "Layout" tab from the Ribbon and click the Margins button, and select Custom Margins... From here, Click the Layout tab. In the drop-down menu next to Section start, make sure that "New page" is selected. Click OK.

• Still not having luck? Try turning on the Paragraph button to see where all of the line breaks are in your Word document. Here is how: At the top of the Ribbon, simply click the ¶ button or use keyboard shortcut: Ctrl + Shift + 8

• If your blank page is in the middle of the document, it may be due to a manual page break. With paragraph marks turned on, you will be able to see the page break. Select it and delete it. It should be gone.

If None of that Works, Look at Your Section Breaks

Next Page, Odd Page, and Even Page section breaks may create a new page in Word. If your empty page occurs at the end of your document and you have a section break there, you can place your cursor directly before the section break and press Delete to delete it. That should remove the blank page.

(If you are having trouble seeing your section breaks try going to the View tab of the Ribbon and switch to Draft mode. This way, you will have a clear picture of where the page breaks are, as they will be represented by long, dotted lines.)

*Reference URL: https://nhls.azurewebsites.net/blog/how-to-delete-an-unwanted-blank-page-in-microsoft-word *

Important Note: If a section break is causing a blank page in the middle of a document, removing the section break can cause formatting issues. If you intended for the content that follows that point to have different formatting, then keep the section break. You don’t want to delete the section break because that would cause the pages before the section break to take on the formatting of the pages after the section break. You can, however, change the section break to a Continuous section break, which will preserve the formatting changes without inserting a blank page.

To change the section breaks to a Continuous section break:

1. Place your cursor after the section break you want to change
2. Go to the Layout tab on the Ribbon
3. Click the Page Setup dialog launcher
4. On the Layout tab of the Page Setup dialog box, click the Section start drop down and select Continuous.

That should remove your blank page without affecting your formatting.

Hopefully, some of the steps above helped you remove that unwanted page in your Word document. Now you can move on to much more important tasks!