How can I remove the space above the footnote separator?

Anonymous
2012-03-10T06:23:19+00:00

I have a long document with many footnotes. On some pages, a large space, sometimes only enough for one double-spaced line, sometimes enough for two, appears above the footnote separator. How can I get rid of this space? I've turned widow-orphan control off, so it shouldn't be related to that. I've looked at the separator under "show notes" in draft view, and it doesn't appear to have any extra spaces associated with it. This actually happens with all of my Word documents.

Thanks for your insight.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

0 comments
Answer accepted by question author
Stefan Blom 352.7K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
2012-03-10T13:52:16+00:00

When viewing the footnote separator (in the footnotes pane), right-click and select Paragraph from the context menu. In the Paragraph dialog box, click the Indents and Spacing tab, and make sure that Spacing Before is set to zero. You may also want to change the Line Spacing to "Single."

Also, to make sure no blank paragraphs is included with the separator, click the ¶ button on the Home tab. Paragraph marks are represented by pilcrows, ¶. Delete any excessive paragraphs if present.

Was this answer helpful?

10+ people found this answer helpful.
0 comments

55 additional answers

Sort by: Oldest
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Suzanne S Barnhill 279.4K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2016-12-28T17:16:32+00:00

    Helpful, but nothing to do with the note separators.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  2. Anonymous
    2016-12-28T20:12:54+00:00

    If by "note separators" you mean to say line separation between footnotes, than yes, it has everything to do with that. If your actual numbers in the footnotes are of differing fonts, you will get an extra space between footnotes. Additionally, if you have a running bibliography in a separate document from which you copy/paste, only select the source text (up to and including the period) and not the space immediately following that period. Otherwise, you introduce the carriage return when you paste into the footnote footer and thereby creating a line separation.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  3. Stefan Blom 352.7K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2016-12-28T23:33:30+00:00

    A note separator is the line that separates the notes from the main body. By default, it is a horizontal line:

    Since you have to select all footnotes and modify the font, you haven't formatted the notes correctly from the start. The most convenient way to (re-)format the footnotes is to modify the Footnote Text paragraph style.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments