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: Turning Off Highlighter Display.

Turning Off Highlighter Display

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated August 18, 2018)
This tip applies to Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003


The highlighter tool in Word is helpful for when you are developing and editing your manuscript. There may be times, however, when you want to print a "clean" version of your manuscript, without the marks. You could, of course, remove all the highlighting marks and then reapply them after printing, but that would be very tedious. Instead, you can follow these steps to suppress the display of the highlighting you previously applied to text:

  1. Choose Options from the Tools menu. Word displays the Options dialog box.
  2. Make sure the View tab is selected. (See Figure 1.)
  3. Figure 1. The View tab of the Options dialog box.

  4. Make sure the Highlight check box is cleared.
  5. Click on OK.

You will notice that the highlighting in your document immediately disappears, but the text remains. When you are again ready to view your highlighting marks, simply reverse the above process. If you print your document with the highlighting turned off, the marks will not appear on the printout either.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (1226) 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: Turning Off Highlighter Display.

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. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Avoiding a Section Break Booby Trap

Section breaks got your document formatting all messed up? It could be because of the way you added the section breaks in ...

Discover More

Opening a Workbook and Suppressing Automatic Macros

Want to stop Excel from running any automatic macros that may be stored with a workbook? Here's how to do it.

Discover More

Running Macros in the Background

Want to run a macro in Excel, but not sure if doing so will tie up your computer? Here's how macro processing really happens.

Discover More

Create Custom Apps with VBA! Discover how to extend the capabilities of Office 2013 (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Access) with VBA programming, using it for writing macros, automating Office applications, and creating custom applications. Check out Mastering VBA for Office 2013 today!

More WordTips (menu)

Changing Existing Highlighting

Need to change the color you previously used to highlight text in your document? You can use Word's Find and Replace tool ...

Discover More

Changing the Highlighting Color

You can highlight words and phrases in your document, much the same as you can mark printed words and phrases with a ...

Discover More

Expanding Colors Available for Highlighting

Want more colors to use with the highlighter? You may be out of luck, unless you decide to use the approach illustrated ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is five minus 3?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)


This Site

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.

Videos
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.