Replace Hidden Text in an MS Word Document

There are occasions when you may have a document that is full of hidden text and now you need to make that hidden text visible.

The quick answer is use the Find and Replace feature in MS Word.

Follow the steps below to learn how.

  1. Click Ctrl + Home to go to the beginning of your document.
  2. Click Ctrl + H to display the Replace tab of the Find and Replace dialog box.
  3. Click the More button if it is available.
  4. Be certain there is nothing in the Find What box and that your insertion point is in the box.
  5. If the No Formatting button is available, click it.
  6. Click the Format button and select Font to display the Font dialog box.
  7. Click the Hidden check box.  A check mark should appear in the check box, if not, continue clicking until it does.
  8. Click OK.  The Find Font dialog box will disappear and the word Hidden will appear beneath the Find What box.
  9. Be certain there is nothing in the Replace With box and your insertion point is in the box.
  10. If the No Formatting button is available, click it.
  11. Click the Format button and select Font to display the Replace Font dialog  box.
  12. Click the Hidden check box two times.
  13. Click OK. The Replace Font dialog box will disappear and the words Not Hidden appear beneath the Replace With box.
  14. Click Replace All.

The steps above will find all the text in your document that has been hidden. It will then turn off the hidden attribute so that none of your text is hidden any longer.

1 thought on “Replace Hidden Text in an MS Word Document”

  1. Hi Carol,
    Thanks for posting the instructions. However, I have Word 2010 and discovered that I had to add this as the first step:

    First, click the “¶” button to display the hidden text. If the hidden text is not displayed, then it cannot be changed to visible text.

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