Shortcut to Return to Document Text

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated June 22, 2019)
This tip applies to Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003

Paul wondered if, when he finishes typing a footnote or endnote in Word, there a way to get back into the text of the document using the keyboard instead of the mouse. There are actually several ways you can accomplish this task.

As far as I can determine, there is no dedicated keyboard shortcut to return to the main document text once you are in a footnote or endnote. Most people use Shift+F5 (or Ctrl+Alt+Z) for this purpose, however. This shortcut cycles through your last several edit locations. When you are typing in a footnote or endnote, this means that it takes you back to your previous edit location, which is typically where you inserted the footnote or endnote reference. This will not always be the case, as you may have jumped into your footnote or endnote directly from the body text by clicking within the note. In that case, Shift+F5 will take you back to wherever you were previously editing your document text.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (3468) 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

Getting Rid of Trailing Spaces in Footnotes and Endnotes

The Find and Replace tool can get rid of trailing spaces in paragraphs quite nicely. If those spaces are at the end of ...

Discover More

Stopping Feet and Inches from Converting to Dates

When pasting information into a worksheet, Excel tries to helpfully convert that information. This can cause undesired ...

Discover More

Deleting Index Entries

When you construct an index you need to insert all sorts of index fields throughout your document. If you want to later ...

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)

Creating Unnumbered Endnotes

Endnotes are indispensable in some types of writing. You may want to create endnotes, however, that don't follow the ...

Discover More

Controlling Footnote Placement

Footnotes are normally placed at the bottom of the page on which the footnote is referenced. However, Word provides some ...

Discover More

Viewing Footnotes

Adding footnotes to a document is essential for some types of writing. How you view those footnotes depends on the ...

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 5 - 3?

2022-02-23 06:25:45

Sarit P

Great tip, thank you!
It also works in word 365.

Is it possible to teach us also how to return to the main document after writing a comment? Nothing works for me :(
Thank you

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.