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why are there gaps between my words in word document

Why is there gaps between my words in my word document.  I notice when I am typing if the last word is to long to fir on that line it goes to thr next line
And leave gaps.

That would be because the paragraph(s) in which your are typing are formatted to have the text justified.

 

You can change the alignment to Left justified by clicking on the Align text left icon in the Paragraph section of the Home tab of the ribbon, or by pressing the CTRL key and the L key together.

Hope this helps,
Doug Robbins - MVP Office Apps & Services (Word)
dougrobbinsmvp@gmail.com
It's time to replace ‘Diversity, Equity & Inclusion’ with ‘Excellence, Opportunity & Civility’ - V Ramaswamy

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Thanks Doug but why is it some lines but not the whole paragraph. So should I just highlight the lines that are like that.

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Alignment is an attribute of the paragraph object so using CTRL+L will affect the whole paragraph.   In the case of the lines that do not appear to have additional spaces between the words, that is because that combination of words happens to fill the line more completely.
Hope this helps,
Doug Robbins - MVP Office Apps & Services (Word)
dougrobbinsmvp@gmail.com
It's time to replace ‘Diversity, Equity & Inclusion’ with ‘Excellence, Opportunity & Civility’ - V Ramaswamy

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When you use "full" justification in 2013 it spreads letters and words based on length of text on the line.  But there are 2 types of "Full" justification. One is on the keyboard, the other is only available as a keyboard shortcut.

Here is a quick example, along with the shortcut keys for the 4 types of justification. I suspect you are using the last one "Distributed Justification". Take note of the widely different spacing in the various lines of the yellow and red highlighted section:



Among other font terminology there is a good example of the types of justification in this article:
Perfect Your Typography With Tracking, Kerning, Leading, And Other Typesetting Techniques

http://designfestival.com/perfect-your-typography-with-tracking-kerning-leading-and-other-typesetting-techniques/


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As computer scientists we are trained to communicate with the dumbest things in the world – computers –
so you’d think we’d be able to communicate quite well with people.
Prof. Doug Fisher

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Rohn: The last link gives a 404 error.

One other possible cause of large gaps between words in fully justified text is if a line break is used on the last line rather than a paragraph break.
Line break = Shift-Enter
Paragraph break = Enter

With a line break, Word will try to spread the last line out, with a paragraph break, it will not.

Two additional notes:

1) Fully justified text may look nice, but it is harder to read.

2) Centering and justification of text in Word is done aligning to the right and left indents, not the page margins. These are often the same but may be different. The indents are paragraph formatting settings; the margins are section (not page) settings.
Volunteering to "pay forward" the help I've received in the Microsoft user community.


Charles Kenyon
Sun Prairie, Wisconsin
wordfaq[at]addbalance[dot]com

Legal site: https://addbalance.com

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Sorry about the dead link, I didn't check it before pasting. That is why I long ago decided to copy "important" information that I find on the web. There is no guarantee that it will still be there in the future

This copy of the page is unfortunately missing the graphics:
http://web.archive.org/web/20120620010954/http://designfestival.com/perfect-your-typography-with-tracking-kerning-leading-and-other-typesetting-techniques

If you really need the graphics to understand the article I'll upload them for you.

The 2 points you make are valid. However, many people are used to justified text from reading newspapers. As long as the justification is done with discretion, ie NOT using the incompetent pre 2013 MS Word default, I do not find it harder to read and find it aesthetically pleasing.  I was hugely disappointed when many years ago I was forced (by employer) to switch from WordPerfect to MS Word and I found out how BADLY justification was done in Word.
.
*****
.
As computer scientists we are trained to communicate with the dumbest things in the world – computers –
so you’d think we’d be able to communicate quite well with people.
Prof. Doug Fisher

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Good Job, pal.

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Hey Doug. I have an issue with a gap between my pages that shouldn't be there. I don't know if you can see, but the last words 'George protested.' and 'No,no.' are supposed to be together. I tried to simply write the words in and it wouldn't indent in the proper place. I adjusted the page layout to be the same as the others, but it still didn't work.

Anything that you can do to help?

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Turn on display of non-printing formatting marks.

Showing non-printing formatting marks in Microsoft Word

Chances are good that the paragraph formatting on the text that moved is set to "Keep with next" and "Keep lines together." Such formatting would be signalled by a small black square in the left margin.

Volunteering to "pay forward" the help I've received in the Microsoft user community.


Charles Kenyon
Sun Prairie, Wisconsin
wordfaq[at]addbalance[dot]com

Legal site: https://addbalance.com

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I'm assuming that you want to keep the following text lines together on the same page, and that only the first line should be indented?

 

Verify that these text lines are in fact a single paragraph as follows: Display nonprinting marks. If you find a paragraph mark (¶) after "protested" and "my," then you have three paragraphs, which you can merge by deleting the paragraph marks.

If the lines are in the same paragraph already, make sure that the indent is set to "First line" as opposed to "Left" in the Paragraph dialog box—or drag the indent indicators on the horizontal ruler.

To keep lines together in a paragraph, select that option in the Paragraph dialog box. 

Stefan Blom
Microsoft 365 Word MVP since 2005
Volunteer Moderator (Office)
MS 365, Win 11 Pro
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Please note that I do not work for Microsoft
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Last updated May 11, 2024 Views 88,864 Applies to: