Remove Formatting Marks in Word: Hide the ¶ Symbols

To remove formatting marks from view in Word, go to Home > Paragraph > Show/Hide ¶ and click the button. On Windows, you can also press Ctrl+Shift+8; on Mac, press Command+8. This hides nonprinting symbols on screen without deleting text or changing the document’s formatting.

What the Show/Hide control does

Word’s Show/Hide control switches the display of nonprinting characters on or off. These marks help show how a document is laid out while you edit, but they are not ordinary text. Hiding them changes only the editing view: it does not remove spaces, paragraph breaks, tabs, or other content, and it does not alter the document’s appearance when printed.

The control is on the Home tab, in the Paragraph group. Its icon resembles a paragraph symbol, ¶. If you cannot see the icon, the Word window may be narrow or the ribbon may be collapsed. Expand the ribbon or widen the window, then look again in the Paragraph group.

Common marks include:

¶ marks the end of a paragraph. Each press of Enter usually creates a new paragraph mark.
Small dots between words represent spaces. They are easier to see than ordinary spaces when formatting marks are on.
Right-pointing arrows represent tab characters, often used to align text.
A bent arrow can mark a manual line break, commonly inserted with Shift+Enter.
Break labels or dotted lines can identify page, column, or section breaks.

Hide formatting marks in Word for Windows

In Microsoft Word for Microsoft 365 on Windows, open the document and select Home > Paragraph > Show/Hide ¶. The symbols should disappear from the editing area. Select the same button again whenever you want to see them. The button is a toggle, so it can be used repeatedly while you work.

The keyboard shortcut is Ctrl+Shift+8. Use the number 8 on the main keyboard row; on some keyboards, the key also requires Shift to type an asterisk, which is why the shortcut is sometimes written as Ctrl+*. If your keyboard layout or application intercepts the shortcut, use the ribbon button instead.

Word may keep the symbols visible when you open another document if a display preference is set to show them. In that case, open File > Options > Display. Under Always show these formatting marks on the screen, clear the boxes for marks you do not want displayed. To hide all listed marks, clear the individual selections and the option to show all formatting marks if it is selected. Select OK to apply the change.

Hide marks in Word for Mac or the web

In Word for Mac, use Home > Paragraph > Show/Hide ¶. The shortcut is generally Command+8. If the shortcut does not work on your Mac, check the Word menu or use the ribbon control; keyboard settings and Word releases can affect which shortcuts are available.

To adjust which marks remain visible, open Word’s settings or preferences and choose View. Look for the controls for nonprinting characters, then clear the marks you do not want to see. The wording and location can differ between Mac versions, so the ribbon toggle is the simplest option when you only need to switch the view temporarily.

In Word for the web, look on the Home tab for the Show/Hide ¶ control in the Paragraph group. The browser version’s ribbon can differ slightly from the desktop app, and some advanced display preferences may not be available there. If you cannot find a setting that is present in desktop Word, open the document in the desktop app and change it there.

Why you might want to see the marks

Formatting symbols can make puzzling layout problems much easier to diagnose. A line that appears indented may begin with several spaces or a tab. A blank-looking line may actually contain an extra paragraph mark. A heading that unexpectedly starts on a new page may follow a page break or section break that is otherwise easy to overlook.

For example, suppose a list item has a large gap before the next paragraph. With marks displayed, you may discover that the gap comes from several empty paragraphs rather than paragraph spacing. You can then remove the extra paragraph breaks instead of trying to compensate with margins. Similarly, a table of contents that shifts after an edit may be affected by tabs or breaks in the text around it.

Showing marks is particularly helpful when editing documents with complicated page layouts, forms, tables, or text copied from other sources. They can reveal the structure behind what you see, but they can also make a page look crowded. It is normal to turn them on for troubleshooting and off again for ordinary reading.

Why marks may still appear

If clicking Show/Hide does not hide every symbol, check Word’s display preferences. One or more specific marks may be set to remain visible in the Display or View settings. Turn off those individual options, or turn off the setting that displays all formatting marks. Then use the ribbon toggle again if needed.

Also check that the visible character is actually a nonprinting mark. A visible arrow, dot, or symbol might be typed text, part of a font, or an object in the document. The Show/Hide button will not remove ordinary typed characters. If the mark appears in a printed page or exported PDF, it is more likely to be actual document content or an object than a viewing aid.

Another common source of confusion is a change in view rather than a change in formatting marks. Zooming, switching between editing and reading views, or opening a document in a browser can change how the page is displayed. None of those actions necessarily removes formatting symbols. Return to the Home tab and check the Show/Hide button, then inspect the display preferences if the marks persist.

Hiding marks is not the same as clearing formatting

People sometimes use remove formatting to mean two different things. Hiding formatting marks removes editing symbols from view. Clearing text formatting changes the selected text’s styling, such as its font, size, color, bolding, or some paragraph formatting. These actions are not interchangeable.

To clear formatting from selected text in Word, select the text and choose Home > Clear All Formatting (the icon commonly looks like an A with an eraser). This affects the text’s formatting; it does not hide paragraph marks throughout the document. Depending on the selection and formatting involved, styles and other paragraph-level settings may need separate adjustment.

For instance, if a paragraph is blue and bold but you only want to hide the ¶ at its end, use Show/Hide. If you want the paragraph to lose its blue and bold appearance, select it and use Clear All Formatting or apply the style you want. Avoid selecting and deleting paragraph marks just to make the symbols disappear: deleting a paragraph mark can join paragraphs and change their formatting or layout.

Practical editing workflow

A useful approach is to treat formatting marks as a diagnostic aid rather than something that must always be on or always be off. When the page looks wrong, turn them on, find the extra break, tab, or paragraph, and correct the underlying structure. Then turn them off to review the page in a cleaner editing view.

Click in the document and turn on Show/Hide ¶.
Look near the unexpected gap, alignment, or page change for tabs, extra paragraph marks, or break indicators.
Make a deliberate edit to the underlying text or layout; do not delete marks unless you understand what they represent.
Toggle Show/Hide off and review the document’s normal on-screen appearance.
Use Print Preview or a PDF export if you need to check the final page layout.

Before removing a section break, for example, consider that it can control page orientation, headers and footers, or page numbering. Deleting it may change the layout of content around it. The visible break mark is a clue to investigate, not an instruction that the break is unnecessary.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do formatting marks print?
Ordinary nonprinting marks displayed by Show/Hide are for editing and are not printed as part of the document. If a symbol appears in a printout or PDF, check whether it was typed into the document or inserted as an object.

Can I hide only paragraph marks and keep other marks visible?
Yes. In Word’s display settings, choose which nonprinting characters to show. On Windows, look under File > Options > Display. On Mac, look under Word’s Settings or Preferences > View. The exact labels can vary by release.

Will hiding formatting marks change the document for other people?
No. Hiding them changes your view, not the document’s text or formatting. It does not remove marks from the file because they are not document content in the first place.

How do I remove formatting from text instead?
Select the text, then choose Home > Clear All Formatting. This changes the selected text’s appearance; it does not switch off the display of paragraph marks or other nonprinting symbols.

Why does Word show dots between words?
When formatting marks are on, Word displays spaces as small dots so you can distinguish spaces from tabs and other characters. Click Show/Hide ¶ to hide them, or adjust which marks are displayed in Word’s settings.

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