Word Count is set to display the word count in your documents, but it also keeps track of several other metrics.
It can help you better understand things in your document like readability when you know the word and character count and how much space your document is using. Did you know you could use your word length and count in a sentence to help determine readability? Knowing these things is also very helpful when publishing and typesetting. Luckily, Word has a most excellent word and character counting tool to do just that!
Follow the steps below to learn how:
- The Word Count tool is located in the lower left-hand side of your Status Bar. The Status bar is at the bottom of your document.
- Word is set to display your word count in your document by default, but it also will keep track of several other metrics.
- Click on the word count and the Word Count window will open.
- You can also find the Word Count window on the Review tab.
Your Word Count window will display a list of the metrics below:
- Pages – The number of pages in your document
- Words – Count of words in your document
- Characters – Characters in your document. This includes punctuation but not spaces
- Paragraphs – Count of paragraphs in your document
Lines – Count of lines in your document. This includes lines with no text:
- At the bottom of your window is a check box that will include textboxes when checked, as well as footnotes and endnotes. This box is, by default, checked. You can uncheck it if you do not wish these inclusions
- You can also display your Character Count with a spaces option on your Status Bar. To do this, you will need to customize your Status Bar
- Hover your mouse over the word count on your Status Bar and right-click. The Customize Status Bar menu will open
- There are many options in this menu but the ones you are looking for can be found in the second section from the top. You will see Word Count and Character Count with spaces. To the left, you will see a small check mark. This indicates that Word Count will appear on your Status Bar. You can click in the space to the left of the Character Count with spaces option to add the check mark and display that option on your Status Bar
- Both options will now appear on your Status Bar
That’s all it takes!
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