Spacebar not working on Word/OneNote (iPad)

Anonymous
2020-05-05T23:52:09+00:00

Hello. I am using an iPad Pro with an external Magic Keyboard, and I came to notice (quite quickly) that on the Microsoft Office suite the spacebar is not working when pressed/clicked on the keyboard. So, I come to ask, is there a way to solve this? Because currently it is kind of useless to use Word/OneNote and not be able to press the spacebar and have a space between words.

I think its possible that the problem is present since the Magic Keyboard is brand new hardware and Microsoft Office Suite may not recognize it yet. And it is a big deal and problem for note taking or word processing in general.

EDIT: Spacebar works properly only when pressing Option + Spacebar, quite annoying to have to do a command just to correctly use the spacebar, seems like a bug to me.

The problem is present on an iPad Pro 2020 11” with the Apple Magic Keybard (Spanish - ISO) running iPad OS 13.4.1and the latest OneNote/Word version.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | iOS

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

42 answers

Sort by: Most helpful
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Anonymous
    2020-06-24T14:47:18+00:00

    Jen,

    Go to setting, the accessibility, on keyboard turn off full access. That solved my spacebar problem.

    jkd

    Was this answer helpful?

    100+ people found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  2. Anonymous
    2020-05-29T05:27:06+00:00

    Hi there,

    I have the exact same issue. I am using an iPad mini 5 (iPad OS 13.5), OneNote 16.37 and an external bluetooth keyboard (B.O.W HB199). This issue is exclusively limited to OneNote: all other applications, including Word, Excel and PowerPoint, work perfectly fine. I have already tried reinstalling OneNote and the issue persists.

    It seems that OneNote doesn't work well with the Keyboards Accessibility features. When Full Keyboard Access is enabled, the space bar is associated with the default Activate command and when pressed it redirects the focus on the Search field rather than inserting a space. When Full Keyboard Access is disabled, the behaviour of the space bar goes back to normal.

    I need to keep the Full Keyboard Access ON at all times and this issue prevents me from using OneNote with an external bluetooth keyboard, making the app totally useless to me. Changing the Command associated with the spacebar would somehow solve the problem, but since this only affects OneNote among hundreds of other applications, it is not worth changing my working behaviour.

    Please let us know if you can reproduce the bug and if you intend to fix it, otherwise I will just have to find an alternative software for note taking.

    Thank you.

    D

    Was this answer helpful?

    70+ people found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  3. Anonymous
    2020-06-24T15:00:30+00:00

    Jen,

    Go to setting, the accessibility, on keyboard turn off full access. That solved my spacebar problem.

    jkd

    Perfect! Thanks so much Jen.

    Was this answer helpful?

    50+ people found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  4. Anonymous
    2020-06-16T23:51:00+00:00

    I am have the same issue of the space bar not spacing in MS OneNote. When I hit the space bar it goes to the search icon. I am using Magic keyboard and have the same issue with a wireless apple keyboard. I believe at one time it was functional. Hope can find a work around.

    Was this answer helpful?

    20+ people found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  5. Anonymous
    2020-06-25T00:18:28+00:00

    Thanks so much...it worked!!

    Was this answer helpful?

    10+ people found this answer helpful.
    0 comments