In addition to the basic content, there are characters in a Word document that do not normally appear on the screen. Some special characters are used by Word for its own purposes. For example, characters that signal the end of a line or paragraph.
Word treats them as non-printable characters. Why display them in the document? Because when you see these characters, it’s easier to understand the spacing and layout of the document.
For example, you can easily determine where you put two spaces between words or made an extra end of a paragraph. But to see the document as it will be printed, you need to hide these characters. We will teach you how to easily hide and display non-printable characters.
Note: The illustrations for this article are from Word 2013.
To display special non-printable characters, open the tab File (Queue).
Click on the menu on the left Parameters (Options).
On the left side of the dialog box Word options (Word Options) click Screen (Display).
In the parameter group Always show these formatting marks on the screen (Always show these formatting marks on the screen) check the boxes for those non-printing characters that you want to always display in the document. Parameter Show all formatting marks (Show all formatting marks) turns on the display of all non-printable characters in the document at once, regardless of the above items.
Press OKto save changes and close the dialog Word options (Word Options).
You can also enable the display of non-printable characters by clicking on the button that looks like an uppercase Latin letter P (only mirrored). This symbol is paragraph mark. The button is in the section Paragraph (Paragraph) tab Home (Home).
Note: Button that looks like a back letter P, performs the same task as the parameter Show all formatting marks (Show all formatting marks), which we considered a little higher. Turning one on or off directly affects the state of the other.
Note that the formatting characters you select on the tab Screen (Display) dialog box Word options (Word Options) will be shown in any case, even if you choose to hide nonprinting characters by clicking on the button with the paragraph sign.