Word - Table of contents including each item of a seperate table as an item in its contents

Apologies if this has already been asked, but the wording of the problem makes it very difficult for google to understand what im asking.

I have a document, with a table of contents at the start, and various headings throughout the document. The "Update table" button of the table of contents updates the table of contents with changes made to headings, and which page they are now on. All is well and good!

BUT.

I have added a table into one of the chapters. Note this is just a standard table, with 9 rows and 4 columns, to organise some information. Now when I update the table of contents however, it updates with every item of this new table becoming an entry in the table of contents, which I do not want. I want the table of contents to ignore the table entirely, it should only show headings.

Is there something I can do here to stop this happening, or is it just the way things are?

Hi, Chlobra!

Thank you for reaching out to us. I am Faith, an independent advisor here and a Microsoft user like you.

The Table of Contents of Microsoft Word automatically includes entries based on the font used in the document. When you first insert the table of contents, word prompts you to select a heading style in the Styles gallery. Make sure that you are not using the font used for headings in the table you have made.

Let me know if this works.

If you have any further questions, I am here to help.

I wish you a great day/night!
Faith
Your Friend, Faith

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Hi Faith,

thanks for your reply. Unfortunately this has not solved the issue.

The text in the table is set to "normal" style, and the table of contents should only be generating from headings 1, 2 and 3 styles.

regards,

Chlobra

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And after saying that, ive just retried changing the style to something else and then back to normal and now it does seem to work...

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Hi Chlobra!

I'm glad to know it worked! Let me know if you need anything else :)
Your Friend, Faith

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When you inserted the table, the active style in the document may have been one to be used in the Table of Contents.

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Charles Kenyon
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wordfaq[at]addbalance[dot]com

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Font is irrelevant; what is relevant is style, and it appears that the table was in a heading style.
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There's another possibility besides an unintended style. When the TOC is created, Word surrounds each heading paragraph with a hidden bookmark so it can hyperlink the entries to the headings. If you accidentally add new content (such as the table) inside an existing bookmark, it will be included in the TOC.

Word is supposed to avoid this problem automatically, but sometimes it doesn't. 

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Select the text in the table and press Ctrl+Q to remove paragraph-level formatting. You will almost certainly find that it resets the "Outline level" of each paragraph back to "Body Text"; that way, these paragraphs won't be referenced in the table of contents.
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
MVP program info: https://mvp.microsoft.com/
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Last updated April 29, 2024 Views 1,685 Applies to: