List of Formatting Symbols in Microsoft Word

Q

Sometimes I see special symbols are showing up at the end of each paragraph in my Microsoft Word document. What are they?

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A

If you see special symbols showing up at the end of each paragraph, they are called formatting symbols (also called formatting marks). Formatting symbols are hidden by default.

You can display them by pressing Ctrl-* or clicking the formatting symbol icon in the "Paragraph" group of the Home tab. Displaying formatting symbols helps you to understand how each part is being formatted.

Here is a list of those formatting symbols or marks and their meanings:

 ➝   U+279D, TRIANGLE-HEADED RIGHTWARDS ARROW, representing a tab
 ·   U+00B7, MIDDLE DOT, representing a space character
 °   U+00B0, DEGREE SIGN, representing a non-breaking space (NBSP) character
  Space+DEGREE SIGN+Space, representing an em space, 
       which is a space equal to the current font size
   Space+DEGREE SIGN, representing an en space, 
       which is a space equal to the half of the current font size
   White rectangle enclosed in rectangle, 
       representing a No-Width Optional Break
   Black rectangle enclosed in rectangle, 
       representing a No-Width Non Break
 ¬   U+00AC, NOT SIGN, representing an optional hyphen
   Long dash (1.5 times longer), representing a non-breaking hyphen
 ■   U+25A0, BLACK SQUARE, representing the start of a styled paragraph
 ¶   U+00B6, PILCROW SIGN, representing the end of a styled paragraph
 ❡   U+2761, CURVED STEM PARAGRAPH SIGN ORNAMENT, 
       representing the end of a normal paragraph
 ↵   U+21B5, DOWNWARDS ARROW WITH CORNER LEFTWARDS, 
       representing a line break, also called soft return
 ▶   U+25B6, BLACK RIGHT-POINTING TRIANGLE, 
       representing a collapsed section 
 ◢   U+25E2, BLACK LOWER RIGHT TRIANGLE, 
       representing an expanded section 
   Circle on X, representing the end of a cell or row of a table
 ⚓   U+2693, ANCHOR', representing the location of an object
 ạ    U+0323, COMBINING DOT BELOW, representing hidden text
   Gray square brackets, representing a bookmark
{…}   Curly brackets, representing a field code
   Dotted line, representing a column break
   Fine dotted line, representing a page break mark
   Double fine dotted line, representing a section break mark
Microsoft Word - List of Formatting Symbols
Microsoft Word - List of Formatting Symbols

 

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2023-12-01, 303230🔥, 43💬