Changing Toolbar Location

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated February 15, 2025)
This tip applies to Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003

You can quickly and easily change the location of Word toolbars to achieve whatever appearance you desire on your screen. For instance, if you double-click your mouse on any portion of a toolbar that is not occupied by a tool, the toolbar is removed from its normal location and appears in its own dialog box.

Once in a dialog box format, you can easily drag a toolbar to any location on the screen desired. If you approach a side of the screen, the toolbar will "dock" to the side.

You should experiment with toolbar locations to determine which is best for the type of work you do.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (1235) applies to Microsoft Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003.

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...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Copying Styles

Styles can make your worksheet formatting easier and more consistent. Here's how to copy styles from an existing workbook ...

Discover More

Printing a Chart

It is inevitable that if you spend time creating a chart you will want to print that chart on your printer. Here's how ...

Discover More

Controlling the Heading Levels Displayed in the Navigation Pane

The Navigation pane can be a handy tool for, well, navigating through your document using the various headings that it ...

Discover More

Do More in Less Time! An easy-to-understand guide to the more advanced features available in the Microsoft 365 version of Word. Enhance the quality of your documents and boost productivity in any field with this in-depth resource. Complete your Word-related tasks more efficiently as you unlock lesser-known tools and learn to quickly access the features you need. Check out Microsoft 365 Word For Professionals For Dummies today!

More WordTips (menu)

Customizing a Toolbar

Word is quite flexible in how you can configure the user interface. This tip explains how you can customize a toolbar so ...

Discover More

Renaming a Toolbar

Word allows you to create custom toolbars that can speed how you work with various tools and macros. When you first ...

Discover More

Quickly Removing a Toolbar Button

Need to remove a toolbar button, but don't want to go through the hassle of displaying the Configure dialog box? You can ...

Discover More

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.

Notify me about new comments ONLY FOR THIS TIP

Notify me about new comments ANYWHERE ON THIS SITE

Hide my email address

What is 4 - 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.