Microsoft Office/Word Ribbon Reference (OS X)

For conceptual information on the Ribbon and this reference, see Ribbon Overview.

Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac also utilizes a main menu bar and a palette called the Toolbox.

On this page you’ll find a concise overview of every button on Microsoft Word’s Ribbon. Controls may be hyperlinked to pages that discuss their functions in more detail. A short description may also be given after the name of the control.

Font Category

 * Font Pop-up Menu — A pop-up menu that lets you choose the font of the selected text.
 * Size Pop-up Menu — A pop-up menu that lets you choose the point size of the selected text. You can also type in a custom value by clicking on the number displayed.
 * Increase Font Size, Decrease Font Size — Increases or decreases the point size of the selected text.
 * Convert Case — Opens a menu that lets you change the case of the selected text.
 * Clear Formatting — Removes any custom formatting applied to the selected text.
 * Bold, Italic, Underline, Small Caps, Strikethrough, Superscript, Subscript — Buttons that toggle the respective formatting attribute when clicked.
 * Font Color, Highlight Color — Changes the color of the selected text, or of the background behind the text.
 * Text Effects — Allows you to add shadow, reflection, glow, or outline effects to the selected text.

Paragraph Category

 * List Styles — Three pop-up menus that let you choose a list style (bulleted, numbered, or hierarchical) to use with the selected text.
 * Indent, Unindent — Adds or removes indentation from the selected text (pushing it to the right or the left, respectively).
 * Columns — Allows you to make a multi-column page layout.
 * Left, Center, Right, Justify — Allows you to specify the horizontal alignment of the selected text.
 * Line Spacing — Allows you to change how closely spaced the lines in the selection are.
 * Borders — Allows you to show or hide borders of a paragraph or table cell.
 * Sort

Styles Category

 * Quick Style List — A scrolling list of some of the most commonly used styles.
 * Change Quick Styles Settings — This button opens a menu that lets you select from twelve predesigned sets of Quick Styles that share common design characteristics.
 * Manage Styles — Opens the Styles pane of the Toolbox.

Insert Category

 * Text Box — Click this button and drag to create a new text box.
 * Shape — Click this button to open a menu of many kinds of predrawn shapes you can drag to insert.
 * Picture — Click this button to insert a picture or clip art image.

Themes Category

 * Themes — Click this button to open a list of predefined font/font size/color scheme sets called themes.

Page Setup Category

 * Orientation — Click this button to choose whether your document will be printed in portrait (tall) or landscape (wide) orientation.
 * Size — Click this button to open a list of common paper sizes.
 * Break — Click this button to open a menu where you can insert different kinds of page or section breaks.

Margins Category

 * Margins — Click this button to open a list of common margin sizes.
 * Top, Bottom, Left, Right — Use these text fields to create a custom margin size.

Text Layout Category

 * Direction — Click this button to change which direction the text is printed in (horizontally, vertically down, or vertically up).
 * Columns — This button is identical to the Columns button on the Home tab. It allows you to make a multi-column page layout.
 * Line Numbers — This button opens a menu of options that tells Word to number each line in the left margin.
 * Hyphenation — This button opens a dialog box that allows you to change automatic hyphenation settings.

Page Background Category

 * Watermark — Click this button to open a dialog box where you can print a watermark behind the text on each page.
 * Color — Click this button to open a menu allowing you to choose a background color for each page.
 * Borders — Click this button to open a dialog box allowing you to place a border around the text on each page.

Grid Category

 * Options — Click this button to open a dialog box containing options relating to an alignment grid.
 * Gridlines — Check this box to display a light grid behind the text on the page.
 * Snap Objects to Others — Check this box to “snap” objects (such as a shape) to the edges of other objects.
 * Snap Objects to Grid — Check this box to “snap” objects to intersections of the alignment grid lines.