When you right-click on an item within Windows, a Context menu is displayed. The items listed on the Context menu vary, depending on the item on which you are right-clicking. Within Word, Context menus are referred to as Shortcut menus. (It is unclear why Word would use different terminology than Windows does.) Word allows you to modify the Shortcut menus which appear when you right-click on an item within your document. As an example of the process you can follow to make changes, try these steps. (These steps assume you want to change the Shortcut menu that appears when you right-click on text within your document.)
Figure 1. The Toolbars tab of the Customize dialog box.
Figure 2. The Commands tab of the Customize dialog box.
WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (389) applies to Microsoft Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003.
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2021-04-15 10:20:34
TerraD
Addon for my Comment 2021-04-15 09:53:29:
Probably you want to add the 'Paragraph...' not only to "Table Text" context menu, but to the context menus "Table Cells" and "Whole Table" as well! Please note: the 'Before:=7' value might be different for each context menu. I found the correct value be trial and error, but a better way is to loop through the items:
Sub EnumerateItems()
Dim myCB As CommandBar
Dim myCBC As CommandBarControl
Dim iX As Long
Set myCB = CommandBars("Table Text")
iX = 1
For Each myCBC In myCB.Controls
Debug.Print iX, myCBC.ID, myCBC.Caption
iX = iX + 1
Next
End Sub
2021-04-15 09:53:29
TerraD
No tools menu (Word 2010 and up)? This is a solution for programmers and not for endusers:
I had the problem to Insert the 'Paragraph...' command into the 'Table Context menu' in Word 2010. As others here, I do not have a Tools menu. After some investigation I found, that the following command in the VBA immediate window will do the trick:
CommandBars("Table Text").Controls.Add ID:=779, Before:=7
To understand how this works search for "CommandBars("Table Text").Controls.Add ID:=779" - there you will learn as well how to remove it as well. And you will find ways to find the names of context menus and possible commands (Paragraph, Font, Text alignment, ..)
To make your change permanent and valid for all future use you have to apply the above change to the 'Normal.dotm' file and save it!
2021-03-08 13:20:20
xxx
Do these commands still exist anywhere in Office 365? I don't think so. I can't immediately find how to change the right-click menu in Word 365
2020-12-25 14:47:50
ToxicOne
Too bad this applies to (almost) two decades ago.
2019-04-22 05:44:39
YossiD
Regarding some of the questions already asked, the ribbon version of Word (at least the early ones - 2007, 2010, etc.) do not support editing the context menus. However, if you still have Word 2003 installed somewhere, you can edit them there and then include them in a template that you can then use for ribbon version of Word. I have done that and it works.
Now, to my question. There are dozens of shortcut menus. How do you know which is which? Is there any way to see the name of the context/shortcut menu when invoking it so as to know which one to modify?
2018-03-11 16:46:58
Crystal
Bless your heart for this tip. . . I searched online for at least an hour to figure out how to paste when I right click on a highlighted misspelling instead of getting spelling suggestions. Thank you!
2017-02-17 10:56:26
Marshall Miller
When in Word 2016 is there a way to customize the Word Shortcut menu so that the Aa from the top of the ribbon can be in the shortcut menu? If so how do I do that?
2016-05-03 09:58:16
Rebecca
I wish to change the selections on the right click menu as edits are being done to a document. Please respond with the method to do this for Word 2016.
2016-02-24 21:29:14
Sarah
I was wondering if there was an updated version of this tip as I don't have a tools tab and can't find customize anywhere except for the ribbon!
Thanks
2015-04-24 17:04:04
Jamie Dimmel
Thank you for this tip. I've used LibreOffice Writer a little and one of the few things I liked was the Context Menu entry to edit the Style. This makes using Word 2000 even easier.
2013-09-08 09:35:19
Harvey
Need to edit the shortcut toolbar in 2013.
Got a version of Word that uses the menu interface (Word 97, Word 2000, Word 2002, or Word 2003)? This site is for you! If you use a later version of Word, visit our WordTips site focusing on the ribbon interface.
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