Changing the Way Footnotes Are Numbered

In Word, footnotes can be automatically numbered from 1 through the number of footnotes in the document. Thus, if your document contains 14 footnotes, they will be numbered 1 through 14. You can change the way footnotes are numbered, however. Word allows you to specify both a starting footnote number and whether the numbering starts over with each new section in your document.

Word allows you to change how it handles footnote numbering. The method you use to make the change depends on the version of Word you are using. If you are using Word 97 or Word 2000, follow these steps:

1. Select Footnote from the Insert menu. Word displays the Footnote and Endnote dialog box.
2. Make sure the Footnote radio button is selected in the Insert area of the dialog box.
3. Click on Options. Word displays the Note Options dialog box.
4. Change the Start At value to reflect where you want Word to start numbering.
5. Change the Numbering area to reflect how you want Word to count your footnotes.
6. Click on OK to close the Note Options dialog box.
7. Click on Close; otherwise click on OK to insert a footnote mark at the current location.

If you are using Word 2002 or Word 2003, follow these steps:

1. Select Reference from the Insert menu, then choose Footnote. Word displays the Footnote and Endnote dialog box. (See Figure 1.)



Figure 1. The Footnote and Endnote dialog box.

2. Make sure the Footnotes radio button is selected.
3. Change the Start At value to reflect where you want Word to start numbering.
4. Change the Numbering area to reflect how you want Word to count your footnotes.
5. Click on Close; otherwise click on OK to insert a footnote mark at the current location.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (3348) 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: Changing the Way Footnotes Are Numbered.