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

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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.

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  1. Suzanne S Barnhill 279.4K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2015-07-04T15:52:51+00:00

    I thought that perhaps what Jessie was saying was that she pressed Enter to split a paragraph that was sticking together, though that doesn't exactly match the description, either.

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  2. Stefan Blom 352.7K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2015-07-05T00:03:08+00:00

    Good point. Anyway, Jessie's post certainly illustrates that resurrecting an old thread may not be a good idea.

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  3. Anonymous
    2015-08-04T16:26:08+00:00

    FYI, in Word 2013, "Normal" View seems to be called "Draft." From there, same procedure: double-click the footnote number in the text, select Footnote Separator, delete or reformat the paragraph markers between the separator line, and voila!

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  4. Anonymous
    2015-10-04T22:17:28+00:00

    Thanks for this feedback. I also have those settings in place, and the footer space itself has not gone away.

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