How to Remove Table Borders in Word

When you add a table to a document in Microsoft Word, it will have borders around the table and its cells.

These borders can be useful in providing some visual separation of the data that you have entered into those cells.

But the needs of your document might not require table borders, which can leave you looking for a way to eliminate them.

Our tutorial below will show you how to remove table lines in Word documents.

How to Get Rid of Table Borders in Word Documents

  1. Open the document.
  2. Click inside a table cell.
  3. Select the Design tab.
  4. Click the Borders button.
  5. Choose None under the Setting column.
  6. Click Apply to and choose Table.
  7. Click the OK button.

Our guide continues below with additional information on how to remove borders from a table in Word, including pictures of these steps.

Word processing applications like the Microsoft Office version, Word, or the Google Apps version, Docs, allow you to add various objects to your document to help you convey information to your readers.

One such object is a table, and you can specify the number of rows and columns included in that table.

But you can also format a table in Word by adjusting the appearance of the table border. You can even remove the table borders in Microsoft Word if you don’t like how they look.

Borders on a table in Word 2010 can be helpful for keeping information organized for the person reading your document. But they can be distracting or ugly, depending upon the styling of the rest of your document.

You may have discovered how to remove the borders from an individual cell of your table, but are struggling to delete all of the borders at once.

Fortunately, this is something that you can accomplish with your Word 2010 document, allowing you to quickly remove all of your table borders at once so that your table information prints without those visible lines.

In some situations, you may want to have your text appear in the middle of the page. Our how to center text in Word tutorial can show you how to do that.

How to Remove Table Lines in Word 2010 (Guide with Pictures)

This tutorial will assume that you already have a Word document containing a table. The steps below will remove the borders from that table so that they are gone when you print the document.

You will still see blue gridlines on your screen to identify the borders of the table. You can read this article to learn how to remove those as well.

These steps will show you how to remove table lines in Word documents.

Step 1: Open your document in Microsoft Word 2010.

Open the document with the table lines.

Step 2: Click anywhere inside the table whose borders you want to remove.

click anywhere inside the table

Click inside one of the table cells.

Step 2: Click the Design tab under Table Tools at the top of the window.

click the design tab

Select the Table Tools – Design tab.

Step 3: Click the Borders button at the right side of the ribbon at the top of the window.

click the borders button

Choose the Borders button in the ribbon.

If you click the arrow to the right of the Borders dropdown menu then you can also see some different border style options as well.

Step 4: Click the None option at the left side of the window, make sure the Table option is selected at the bottom-right of the window under Apply To, then click the OK button at the bottom of the window.

how to remove the borders from a table in word 2010

Select None, then choose Table under Apply To, then click OK.

You can then navigate to the Print Preview window and see how your table will look now that it is set to print without borders.

table without borders

Now that you know how to remove table lines in Word you will be able to use this whenever you want to get rid of the borders in a table in your document, or even if you want to change something about the style of your table borders.

More Information on How to Remove Table Borders in Word 2010

Removing the borders from a table in a Microsoft Word document will only remove the lines that signify the borders. They are still technically there, even if you can’t see them. This means that data that you add to cells in your table will still respect the row and column boundaries of that table.

If you are trying to create one big “cell” then you may want to try using a text box from the Insert menu, or use a single-cell table instead. You can do this by adding a table that is only one row by one column. As you add content to that cell it will expand to accommodate the content, allowing that one cell to become quite large.

There are some other border options available for Microsoft Word tables as well. The options include:

  • Box
  • All
  • Grid
  • Custom
  • None

If you don’t want to remove the table borders entirely then you may try one of those options instead to see if it produces the desired result. A table in Microsoft Word can look very different when you adjust the table gridlines or the way that your table cells look. Even if you don’t want the full set of lines on your horizontal and vertical rows if can be useful to format borders for the table so that you have black borders going around the perimeter of the whole table to separate it from the rest of the document content.

If you choose “None” then this border option will remove gridlines from the table entirely. If you select “Box” then this option will only show the outside borders of the table

Another interesting thing that you can try is setting the color of the table border to white, or whatever the page background color is in your document. You can change the table border color in Word from the Borders and Shading dialog box that we used in the steps above, but click the Color drop down menu instead and choose the color that matches the document background.

After you erase table lines in Word you may not like the way that it makes your table look. Fortunately you can always go back to the Borders and Shading window and choose a different table border setting to restore the lines to the table.

These same steps will work in most newer versions of Microsoft Word as well. In some versions, however, you will be selecting the Table Design tab rather than the Design tab.

If you want to reduce the number of sheets on which your document is printed, you can learn how to print two pages on one sheet in Word 2010.

Frequently Asked Questions About How to Remove Table Lines in Word

How do I delete an entire table from my Word document?

While the focus of this article has been on erasing table lines, you might discover that you need to remove the table from the document entirely.

If you place your mouse pointer inside one of the table cells you can select the Layout option in the menu bar at the top of the window.

You can then click the Delete button, and choose the Delete Table option to remove the table and its contents.

How do I adjust column width for an MS Word table?

If you would like to make a column smaller or larger in your Word table, then you can position your mouse over the left or right column border until you see a vertical line with an arrow on either side.

If you click and drag when you see this icon you will be able to make the column smaller or larger.

How can I add a new table to an open Word document?

If you need to add a table to your document then you can click in the document at the point where you want the table, then select the Insert tab at the upper left corner of the window.

You can then click the Table button, and choose the number of rows and columns for the table.

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