Word – How to resize Word shape object with keyboard

keyboard shortcutsmicrosoft wordresizingshapes

I have some shapes that are very small. I can move these with the arrow keys, but resizing them does not seem to be possible (eg. with Shift-arrow or Ctrl-arrow).

The Keyboard shortcuts for working with shapes, text boxes, and WordArt online help does not mention anything either. (Note: The Keyboard shortcuts for SmartArt graphics help topic does mention Shift-arrow, but as I wrote, that does not work).

Even if I zoom, as soon as the width of the object becomes so small that the indicated vertical resize handle disappears, I no longer see a way to resize the shape vertically:

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Surely I can keep zooming and using the mouse, but I'm looking for a faster way that also resizes 'per pixel'.

Best Answer

In Word 2010 on Windows, as noted by K V, shapes can be resized using Shift+(arrow key) combinations:

  • Shift+→ (right arrow) – Increase shape width

  • Shift+← (left arrow) – Decrease shape width

  • Shift+↑ (up arrow) – Increase shape height

  • Shift+↓ (down arrow) – Decrease shape height

These resize operations are 'coarse,' as they resize the shape by several pixels for each keypress. If a finer resize resolution is needed, use Ctrl+Shift+(arrow key) instead.

In my hands, all of these resizes operate in a 'centered' fashion for floating shapes: the position of the shape on the page doesn't change as it's resized.

To note, this does not work in Word 2007 for Windows; the behavior instead is that described by OP in his comment to K V's answer, where the selection just hops over to the main text of the document. While I don't know of a simple keyboard shortcut for resizing in this situation, a possible workaround is to use the Size tools in the Drawing Tools Ribbon menu:

Ribbon screencap

On my system, shapes can be resized in increments of 0.01" via this approach.

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