Remove Page Breaks in Word Using Show/Hide (Windows)
This is probably the simplest way to find and remove a page break in Word. Word gives you a view revealing all of the hidden layout and markup elements that are added to your document (both manual and automatically-added elements). Once you’ve revealed them, they’re easy to remove.
Select the Home tab in the ribbon. In the Paragraph section, select the Show/Hide icon (it looks like ¶). All page breaks in the document will appear on the page. Highlight the page break you want to delete and press the Delete key. Because you removed the page break, all of the text from the previous page will now appear up against the text that was above it, so you’ll need to add some kind of spacing (for example, press Enter) to make it legible again. You’ll probably want to deselect the Show/Hide icon, too.
Using Find and Replace (Windows)
Got a document full of a bunch of page breaks and want to remove them all at once? You can use Word to find and replace page breaks just like any other element of your document.
Go to the Home tab. In the Editing section, select Replace. Alternatively, use the Ctrl+H keyboard shortcut to open the Find and Replace window. Select More. Select Special. Select Manual Page Breaks. In the Replace field, add a single space with the space bar (you can also use a number or symbol to make it easier to find any place where you removed a page break). Select Replace All and every page break in your document will be replaced by whatever you entered in the Replace field. You’ll probably need to go back and clean up the results of the find-and-replace, but all page breaks are now removed.
Remove Page Breaks in Word Using Show/Hide (Mac)
The steps are basically the same in Word for Mac, but the screen layout is a little different.
In the ribbon, click Home. Click the Show/Hide icon (¶). If your Word window is narrow, you need to click Paragraph to reveal the Show/Hide icon. All page breaks in the document will appear on the page. Highlight the page break you want to delete and click the Delete key. Because you removed the page break, all of the text from the previous page will now be up against the text that was above it. You’ll need to add some kind of spacing (for example, press Enter) to make it legible again. You’ll probably want to deselect the Show/Hide icon, too.
Using Find and Replace (Mac)
Again, the process is the same for Mac, but the menu layouts are slightly different.
Open the Find and Replace pane (Edit > Find > Replace or magnifying glass > magnifying glass > Replace). In the Find field, click the down arrow. Click Manual Page Break. In the Replace field, add a single space with the space bar (you can also use a number or symbol to make it easier to find any place where you removed a page break). All page breaks in the document appear in the column below. Click Replace All and every page break in your document will be replaced by whatever you used in the last step. You’ll probably need to go back and clean up the results of the find-and-replace, but all page breaks are now removed.
Controlling When Word Inserts Page Breaks
All of the tips so far apply to page breaks that you’ve added manually, but in some cases, Word also adds automatic page breaks. To control your settings for those, go to Home > Paragraph > Line and Page Breaks. The options here are:
Widow/Orphan Control: This keeps the last word of a sentence from getting stranded on a new page and keeps two lines of text together at all times. If you’re OK with a stranded word and no page break, uncheck this. Keep with next: Keeps at least two paragraphs together at all times. Keep lines together: This keeps paragraphs as intact units and stops Word from adding a break in the middle of a paragraph. Page break before: Adds a page break before a given paragraph to keep the whole block of text together.
