Footnotes and Endnotes in Microsoft Word
Footnotes and endnotes are useful tools for adding citations, comments, or explanations to your text.
This guide will walk you through the steps to insert and manage footnotes and endnotes in Microsoft Word.
Footnotes and endnotes both serve a similar purpose. The key difference between them lies in their placement within the document. Footnotes appear at the bottom of the page where the reference is made, making it easy for readers to access the supplementary information without leaving the current page. In contrast, endnotes are collected at the end of a section, chapter, or the entire document, which can be less disruptive to the flow of the text but may require readers to navigate to a different part of the document to find the additional information. These can be converted from one to the other easily and will be explained later on the page.
Inserting Footnotes
Place your cursor where you want the footnote number to appear in the text.
Go to the "References" tab on the Ribbon. In the Footnotes group, click "Insert Footnote":
A superscript number will appear in the text, and the cursor will move to the bottom of the page where you can type your footnote.
Type the text of your footnote.
Inserting Endnotes
Place your cursor where you want the endnote number to appear in the text.
Go to the "References" tab on the Ribbon. In the Footnotes group, click "Insert Endnote":
A superscript number will appear in the text, and the cursor will move to the end of the document where you can type your endnote.
Type the text of your endnote.
Customising Footnotes and Endnotes
Go to the "References" tab and click the small arrow in the bottom right corner of the Footnotes group to open the Footnote and Endnote dialogue box
In the dialogue box, you can customise the format and location of your footnotes and endnotes. Options include numbering format (e.g., 1, 2, 3 or i, ii, iii), starting number, and whether the notes appear at the end of each section or at the end of the document.
After customising the settings, click "Apply" to implement the changes.
Converting Footnotes to Endnotes (and Vice Versa)
In the "References" tab, click the small arrow in the bottom right corner of the Footnotes group to open the Footnote and Endnote dialogue box:
In the dialogue box, click "Convert…". A new dialogue box will open where you can choose to convert all footnotes to endnotes, endnotes to footnotes, or swap them:
Select your desired conversion option and click "OK."