How do I keep the ribbon always visible?

Anonymous
2011-03-16T22:54:08+00:00

When I am in a Word doc and want to, e.g., change the font, I have to click on Home, then font size.  Afterwards, the ribbon disappears.  If I want to do any other formatting, I again have to click on Home, etc.

When I first started using Word in 2010 Starter, the ribbon was always visible; I would like that again.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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Jay Freedman 208.3K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2011-03-17T00:38:03+00:00

The ribbon is "minimized". There are three ways to "unminimize" it:

  • Press Ctrl+F1 (this is an on/off toggle).
  • Double-click any of the tabs (Home, View, etc.).
  • Right-click any of the tabs or the Quick Access Toolbar and uncheck "Minimize the ribbon". Edit: In Office 2013, there's an additional way. The icon (shown below by the red box) in the top right corner of the window has a dropdown menu. Click Show Tabs and Commands to see the full ribbon. The Auto-hide Ribbon choice is new -- it hides both the tabs and the buttons to give you the most reading/editing space for the document. To show the ribbon temporarily, click once at the top of the window. As soon as you click a button on the ribbon, it will hide again. To turn this off, click the icon and click one of the other two choices.

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Jay Freedman 208.3K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2012-03-27T20:23:12+00:00

If you expand the ribbon by any of the methods I listed above, it should stay expanded until you do the reverse of one of those methods. The state should stay unchanged even if you shut down and restart Word or Windows.

If that isn't happening for you, there are a couple of possibilities: There may be an add-in that's improperly changing the ribbon's visibility, or there may be a problem in the registry that prevents the ribbon's state from being saved. Neither of these is very likely.

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  1. Charles Kenyon 171.1K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2015-09-28T09:51:34+00:00

    You want to be able to change the functioning of a huge program without knowing programming. We all have things we want, we don't always get them. (Sounds like a Rolling Stones song...)

    This forum is not the complaint window. It is a place to get help from experienced fellow users. If you want that help, lose a bit of the attitude.

    If you've read through this entire thread, you know that you can set it the way you want. See Jay Freedman's post marked as an answer. It will remain that way until you change it again. This is true unless there is some Add-In changing it. If you find that it is not the case for you, write back and someone will try to help you step through what can be done.

    The way it works now is in response to user complaints about how much screen space was being taken up and wanting to give the user (you and me) more control over that.

    I do understand and feel with you your frustration at wanting to talk with someone at Microsoft and vent.

    Top-right of window by the Close X is a drop-down arrow dealing with the Ribbon - Word 2013+ only. You need to click on Show Tabs and Commands.

    The Ribbons of Microsoft Word 2007-2013

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-09-29T05:17:08+00:00

    I had to chuckle at your words.  I read Freedman's post and tried it.  It did not work.

    I tried your advice before and it did not work. At best, the tabs remain in place, but the ribbon is like a handkerchief in a magician's hands.  It is very frustrating for someone as clumsy as I, who types like a hen pecks corn, and even more frustrating trying to do this with bratwursts for fingers, on a touchscreen tablet .

    Of course, that is nor Microsoft's problems.

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  3. Anonymous
    2015-12-21T21:47:53+00:00

    I support about 180 users with MS Office 2013. All but one of the machines work as described here. On the one in question it won't stick. I set it and within the hour the user complains it is off again. One of the answers here said there could be something wrong with an add-in or a registry setting. This user has the same add-ins that all do, nothing more. He is not computer literate enought to have edited the registry. 

    Sounds like I need to remove all add-ins and put them back one at a time until I find the offending one. Is that correct?

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