Word Footnotes And Citations
A footnote places a small reference note at the bottom of the same page where its matching marker appears, keeping supporting detail close to the relevant sentence. An endnote instead collects every note together at the very end of the document or section, suited to a reader who prefers browsing all references in one place rather than page by page.
Inserting A Footnote
Placing the cursor immediately after the word needing a citation, then selecting Insert Footnote from the References tab, adds a small superscript number at that spot and moves the cursor down to a matching numbered space at the page bottom, ready for the note's actual text.
Automatic Renumbering
Inserting a new footnote earlier in the document automatically renumbers every following footnote to stay sequential, avoiding the tedious manual correction a typed numbering system would demand. Deleting a footnote marker removes both the number and its matching note together, keeping the two permanently linked.
Managing Sources With The Citations Tool
A separate Citations and Bibliography group, also on the References tab, tracks full source details such as author, title, and publication year in a structured database rather than plain footnote text. Selecting a citation style, such as APA or MLA, formats every inserted citation consistently according to that style's exact punctuation and ordering rules.
Common in social sciences, formatting an in-text citation with the author's last name and publication year.
Common in humanities writing, formatting an in-text citation with the author's last name and a page number.
Offers both a footnote-based format and an author-date format, common in history and some publishing fields.
Generating A Bibliography
Once several sources exist inside the citation database, a Bibliography button compiles every one of them into a properly formatted reference list, inserted at the cursor's current position. Adding a new source and citing it later updates this list automatically the next time it refreshes, matching the same update pattern used by the table of contents feature.
Typing complete author, title, and date information into the citation manager right away avoids a scramble to track down missing details before final submission.
Switching styles partway through a document reformats every citation already inserted, so confirming the required style early avoids repeated adjustment.
Converting Footnotes To Endnotes
A Convert option inside the Footnote and Endnote dialog switches every existing footnote across the whole document into an endnote, or the reverse, without retyping a single note manually. This flexibility suits a learner who drafts with footnotes for convenience, then switches to endnotes to match a publisher's specific formatting requirement late in the process.
Deleting A Note Safely
Removing a footnote requires deleting its small superscript marker in the body text itself, not the note text at the page bottom. Deleting the marker removes both pieces together automatically, while attempting to delete only the bottom note text alone leaves a stray, empty marker behind.