How to Use Find and Replace Feature in Microsoft Word

Microsoft Word's 'Find and Replace' feature is a fabulous time (and sanity) saver. Whether you are editing for spelling, punctuation or maybe you're like me and want to change a character's name in your manuscript, find and replace can save you a few valuable moments or weeks of hair pulling, depending on the size of your document.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Microsoft Word

1. Open your document
2. Click 'Edit'
3. Select 'Find' from the drop down menu that comes up
4. In the 'find what' window, type in the word you wish to look for.
5. Click 'Find Next'
6. Your specified word will be highlighted at the first place it is found. You can now click 'find next' to find the next time the word appears or simply click cancel and go directly to the word yourself.
7. To replace your word with another word or corrected word, click 'replace' under your edit men. (step 3)
   
   or...
   
   You can click the Find tab that you will see during step 4
8. Type in the word you wish to find in the 'find what' blank.
9. Type in the word you wish to replace it with in the 'replace with' blank.
10. Click the 'replace' button to replace the word one at a time to be more selective. Then click 'find next' button if the program doesn't automatically take you to the next occurrence of the word.
11. Click the 'replace all' button to replace all occurrences of that word in the entire document with one click. Wow! The power of that one click!!

Tips & Warnings

• You can replace other things that just words with the find and replace feature such as replacing certain special characters or even spacings.
• Be careful when replacing words such as your and you're. Words such as these should only be replaced one at a time versus using the mighty 'replace all' button.