Word – Multiple section breaks per page in MS Word causing page numbers to repeat

footersmicrosoft wordpage-numbers

I have a Word document with numerous section breaks throughout. Because some of my content is arranged in two columns (with a variety of tables and figures in one column), many of the section breaks are continuous and appear on the same page.

I added page numbers in the footer and checked "Continue from previous section" on every page. However, for pages with more than one (continuous) section break on a preceding page, the page numbers restart at 1 or repeat.

Looking at the footer, I can see that the section number (labeling the footer) skips ahead (e.g., from -Section 11- to -Section 13-). I've tried selecting text in the section, opening "Format Page Numbers," and making sure "Continue from previous section" is still selected. That's made no difference.

The document is long, and content is under constant revision. Handcoding the page numbers is my last resort. Has anyone found a solution for this problem?

Best Answer

I ran into a very similar issue not too long ago and came across this Microsoft forum post: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice/forum/msoffice_word-mso_winother/page-numbering-off-when-using-continuous-section/51c65293-25e4-4660-a5f9-ee2c08a70dca

In that post, Stefan Blom posted the following macro that once entered and run solved the page numbering issue:

Sub SetContinuousPageNumbering()
Dim s As Section
For Each s In ActiveDocument.Sections
s.Headers(wdHeaderFooterPrimary) _
.PageNumbers.RestartNumberingAtSection = False
Next s
End Sub

Hope this helps.

Related Solutions

Word – Continuous page numbers in Word 2007 document with section breaks

Add the following macro to your document and run it once:

Sub Main()
    On Error Resume Next
    For i = 0 To ActiveDocument.Sections.Count
        ActiveDocument.Sections(i).Footers(wdHeaderFooterEvenPages).PageNumbers.RestartNumberingAtSection = False
        ActiveDocument.Sections(i).Footers(wdHeaderFooterFirstPage).PageNumbers.RestartNumberingAtSection = False
        ActiveDocument.Sections(i).Footers(wdHeaderFooterPrimary).PageNumbers.RestartNumberingAtSection = False
    Next i
End Sub

You can add this macro by pressing ALT-F11. That'll open the VBA window. Right click "ThisDocument" and choose "Insert/Module". Copy and paste the code from above, then press F5. This will force every section to continous page numbering.

Word – MS Word: formatting reveals no section breaks, but header/footer show multiple sections

Thanks to a comment about hidden text, I was reminded of a known problem with track changes and automatic ToC/ lists of tables: sometimes even if you are looking at the final version (no markup), it will skip some entries no matter how many times you redo the field codes, so a list of tables will include 1, 2, 4, 7, 8, 9, 11. Once you accept all changes, if you autoupdate the list again, it will be correct.

With that in mind, I accepted all changes, and lo and behold the section breaks were corrected. I made no new changes, but the document structure finally reflected what the formatting codes said should have been there all along. There must be some logic as to which changes Word implements at which stage of the process, but it seems pretty arbitrary to me.

Thanks again!

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Word – Continuous page numbers in Word 2007 document with section breaks

Word – MS Word: formatting reveals no section breaks, but header/footer show multiple sections

Related Question