Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. If you are using a later version (Word 2007 or later), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for later versions of Word, click here: Searching for Tabs.

Searching for Tabs

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated March 21, 2026)
This tip applies to Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003

Word allows you to search not just for text, but also for special characters which normally do not print. If you are working with documents that use tabular material, you will find yourself searching for tab characters quite a bit. To search for tabs, follow these steps:

Choose Find from the Edit menu. Word displays the Find tab of the Find and Replace dialog box. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1. The Find tab of the Find and Replace dialog box.

In the Find What box, enter the text for which you want to search. To search for a tab character, enter ^t (it is important to use a lowercase t).
Set other searching parameters, as desired.
Click on Find Next.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (1077) applies to Microsoft Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. You can find a version of this tip for the ribbon interface of Word (Word 2007 and later) here: Searching for Tabs.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. Learn more about Allen...

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