How to Control a Word Table’s Horizontal Alignment

Inserting a table in Microsoft Word is easy, but the default settings don’t always work exactly the way you want. For example, the default alignment is offset from the left margin. What if you want the table to be centered or flush with the right margin? The good news is that it’s easy to rearrange the table.

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Default table left aligned

When you insert a table or convert text to a table, single word Place it between the left and right margins. You can easily change this setting. There are several ways to align a table horizontally between the left and right margins.

The first thing you might want to change is the width. There won’t be enough text to fill the cell, and it may look weird. Additionally, readability is lower. Your eyes are trying to see the entire table at once, rather than reading the content. Fortunately, changing the width is easy.

1. Click the table to select it. Doing so will reveal two handles: one in the upper left corner and one in the lower right corner.
2. Hover your mouse over the handle in the lower right corner and your mouse will turn into a double arrow.
3. Simply drag up and left to reduce the width of the table and the width of each cell.

A resized table will fit better, and you can easily stop here if you don’t want it to align differently.

See: Learn how to create a table Use HTML. (Technological Republic)

How to align table margins in Word

When your table doesn’t extend from the left edge to the right edge, you may need to align it. You can apply specific alignment or indentation of the table.

You have three alignment options: left, center, and right. The default table is aligned with the left margin. You can easily check this by selecting the entire table (instead of the cells) and looking at the alignment options in the Paragraph group on the Home tab. The image above shows the Align Left option selected. To align the table, select the table and click one of the other options: Center or Left. Using these three options, you can quickly and easily align your table to the left, center, or right.

You can also align the table using the Table Properties option. To access these options, right-click anywhere in the table and select Table Properties from the submenu that appears. On the Table tab, select an option from the Alignment section and click OK. There are a lot of property options, but we’re only interested in the properties in the alignment section. You may want to go back later and review all other options.

The final alignment option is to indent from the left. This allows you to easily indent the table from the left border. If you need to be precise, you can use the “Indent from left” option. You can do the same thing by dragging the table and using the rulers to hold it in place. Or use the Increase Indentation option in the Paragraph group to move the table a half-inch at a time.

Aligning the contents of each cell is just as easy using table properties. On the Table tab, click the Options button to turn on Table Options.

The Default Cell Margins section lets you change the size of all four margins. By default, the Automatically resize to fit content option is selected. To center or right-align the contents of a cell, use the alignment options in the Paragraph group. However, you must select text and not the entire table; otherwise, clicking the option will align the table rather than the contents of the cells.

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How to align tables in Word Online

Alignment is slightly different in Word Online, but still simple. With the table selected, right-click on the table and select Paragraph Options. Use the Alignment drop-down list in the General section. Using the Alignment option on the menu will align the text within the cell instead of the text within the table. Everything we’ve done so far is pretty clear, but you may have noticed that the text is positioned as a paragraph. The text doesn’t flow around the table.

How to make text wrap around a table

If you want text to wrap around the table, you must change another default option. Returns the table properties dialog box. Below the alignment options, you’ll see text wrapping options. The default is no line wrapping. Just click on the “Around” option and then click on “OK”. This option will pull the text below and wrap it around the table. I clicked the backspace key twice to pull the text up so that it aligned with the top of the table. Pulling text up in this way may cause the paragraph to take on some of the properties of the table. Just click “Normal” to fix it.

Alignment single word The table as a whole is a simple task, and there are several ways to achieve the alignment you want.

Megan Krause updated this article.