Paragraph formats and pagination

There are several paragraph formats that affect pagination. They can be accessed in the Paragraph dialog box, on the Line and Page Breaks tab.

Paragraph pagination formats are a powerful and recommended alternative to using hard page breaks or empty lines to control pagination.

Widow/Orphan Control

This option ensures that, when a paragraph spans two pages, there will not be one line stranded on one page when the rest of the paragraph is on the other. There will always be a minimum of two lines at the bottom of one page or the top of the next.

Keep with next

This option causes the paragraph to stay on the same page with the following paragraph. You can use the option, for example, to ensure that a heading stays with a subheading or with the first paragraph of text after the heading. You can also use the option to ensure items in a list stay on the same page: select all items of the list except the last item, then apply Keep with next.

Keep lines together

When you want to ensure that all lines in a paragraph stay on the same page, select Keep lines together. Where the Widow/Orphan control option ensures that there are at least two lines of the paragraph on each page, this option keeps all lines on one page.

Page break before

This paragraph format causes Word to move the paragraph to the top of the following page. It is more efficient than a hard page break as it is not a hidden character and therefore cannot be accidentally deleted.

Define styles with these paragraph formats to ensure a consistent treatment of text and pagination.