How to Change Orientation of One Page in Word? 3 Easy Ways
(Note: This guide on how to change orientation of one page in Word is suitable for all MS Word versions including Office 365)
The page’s orientation is an important formatting feature that describes the page direction in which the contents are to be displayed or printed.
There are two types of page orientation in Microsoft Word: Portrait and Landscape. These two orientations are used for different purposes.
The portrait page orientation is characterized by the dimensions of the page being greater in length than in width. In simpler terms, the page will be oriented vertically. This orientation is mostly preferred when you have to create content like documents, articles, newsletters, or scientific reports.
But, for content with tables or images, the landscape orientation is more suitable where the width of the page is greater than the length, i.e., the page will be oriented horizontally.
Depending on your purposes and needs, you can change the orientation of the pages in your Word document. Additionally, Microsoft Word also gives you the flexibility to change the orientation of one page in relation to the other pages.
In this article, you will learn how to change the page orientation for a single page or the whole document using 3 easy methods.
You’ll Learn:
- Change Orientation of the Whole Document
- How to Change Orientation of One Page in Word?
- Change the Orientation of the Selected Content
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Change Orientation of the Whole Document
By default, the orientation of the pages in a Word document will be portrait. When you have to extensively use images or tables when creating a picture book or a datasheet, you will have to change the orientation of all the pages to landscape.
Let us see how.
- First, open the Word document.
- Click on the Layout main menu ribbon.
- Under the Page Setup section, click on the dropdown from Orientation and select Landscape.
- This will instantly change the orientation of the page to landscape.
Note: It is always a better practice to change the orientation of the page and then enter the content. Changing the orientation after entering the content sometimes changes the alignment and formatting of the data entered.
How to Change Orientation of One Page in Word?
In some cases, you will have to use both portrait and landscape orientations to depict the content in the best format possible. In such cases, you will not have the need to change the orientation of the whole document.
Microsoft Word gives you the flexibility to maintain the default orientation throughout the document and only change the orientation of specific pages.
- To change the orientation of one page in Word, first, select the contents of the page that you want to change.
- Navigate to the Layout main menu ribbon.
- Under the Page Setup section, click on the dropdown from Orientation and select Landscape.
- This changes the orientation of the whole page to landscape.
Note: You can see that when you directly change the orientation from the dropdown, the orientation of the whole page gets changed even when you select only a section of the page.
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Change the Orientation of the Selected Content
From the above method, you can only change the orientation of the whole page. But, if you only want to change the orientation of the text that you have selected, you can use the below-given methods.
Using the Page Setup Dialog Box
This is one method to change the orientation of a particular section of the page.
- First, select only the particular content you want to landscape.
- Then, navigate to the Layout main menu ribbon.
- Under the Page Setup section, click on the button for Page Setup settings, which can be seen as a small extend button.
- This opens the Page Setup dialog box.
- You can also go to the Page Setup dialog box by clicking on Custom Margins from the Margins dropdown or More Paper Sizes from the Size dropdown.
- In the dialog box, click on the Margins tab. Under the Orientation section, select Landscape, and in the Apply to dropdown, click on Selected Text.
- Click OK.
- This only changes the orientation of the selected page to landscape orientation.
- If you want to apply the settings to all the pages and other Word documents, click on the Set As Default button.
Using Page Breaks
This is another method to change the orientation of the selected section of the page. This method works on the principle that adding a page break converts that section into a page and then changing the orientation.
- To insert a page break, select a section of the page or place the cursor. In this case, let us break the page before and after the second table.
- Navigate to the Layout main menu ribbon. Under the Page Setup section, click on the dropdown from Breaks and select Next Page.
- This makes the selected section a separate page.
- Now, again navigate to Layout. Click on the dropdown from Orientation and select Landscape.
This changes the orientation of the selected section.
Frequently Asked Questions
How to change the orientation of the whole document in Word?
Open the Word document and navigate to Layout. Under the Page Setup section, click on the dropdown from Orientation and select Portrait/Landscape orientation.
How to change the orientation of one page in Word?
To only change the orientation of one page, select any of the content on that particular page and then navigate to Layout>Page Setup>Orientation and select the orientation you want.
How to change only the orientation of the selected section in Word?
To change the orientation of the selected section, select the content and navigate to the Layout main menu ribbon. Click on the Page Setup settings. In the dialog box, select Landscape and select Apply to Selected Text.
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Closing Thoughts
Changing the orientation of the page makes it convenient to add a particular type of data which will help the user understand the content better.
In this article, we saw how to change the orientation of one page in Word. We also saw how to change the orientation of the whole document. You can choose to keep the portrait or landscape orientation before you start your content or after finishing them.
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Simon Calder
Chris “Simon” Calder was working as a Project Manager in IT for one of Los Angeles’ most prestigious cultural institutions, LACMA.He taught himself to use Microsoft Project from a giant textbook and hated every moment of it. Online learning was in its infancy then, but he spotted an opportunity and made an online MS Project course - the rest, as they say, is history!
