Topic: Word Count

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A Quick-and-Dirty Word Count Got an editor or teacher who wants you to calculate the number of words in a document the “old fashioned way?” You can do it by using a compound field, discussed in this tip. Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

Counting Words the Old Fashioned Way Using the old editorial method of figuring out the number of words in a document. Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

Counting Words the Old Fashioned Way with WordBasic Using the old editorial method of figuring out the number of words in a document. Microsoft Word versions: 6 | 95

Displaying a Live Word Count You can use Tools | Word Count to figure out how many words are in your document. If you want a real-time, constantly updated word count, then you will need to develop your own tools, as described in this tip. Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

Generating a Count of Word Occurrences Do you need to know the frequency with which certain words occur in your documents? There is no built-in way to derive this information in Word, but you can use the techniques in this tip to get just what you need. Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003 | 2007

Ignoring Hyphens in Word Counts When you do a word count, Word treats hyphenated phrases as a single word. If you prefer a word count that treats hyphenated phrases as multiple words, then you need to perform a few steps to get the desired result. This tip explains why it makes sense to treat hyphenated phrases as single words, and then shows how you can bypass this common-sense approach. Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

Including Footnotes and Endnotes in Word Counts Unless you instruct it otherwise, Word will not check footnotes or endnotes when calculating the number of words in a document. Microsoft Word versions: 6 | 95 | 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

Including Text Box Text In Word Counts If you use text boxes in the layout of your documents, you should know that any word counts you perform do not include any words in those text boxes. If you want to include those words in your counts, you need the information in this tip. Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

Running Word Counts Do you need to keep track of how many words are in your document? Word provides a tool to display a word count on demand, but you may want something more automatic, like a running word count. The macro in this tip can be used to display a handy word count that refreshes on a regular interval. Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

Word and Character Count Information Using fields you can easily add information to you document concerning the number of words and characters in a document. This tip even provides a way that you can calculate and display the average word length in your document. Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

Word Count for a Section Dynamic word counts for your entire document are easy to get when you use using fields. There is no built-in method to get a dynamic word count of just a section of your document. This tip discusses the lacking feature and provides ways you can get the desired information. Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003 | 2007

Word Count is Zero Understanding why Word may show that you have no words in your document. Microsoft Word versions: 6 | 95 | 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

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