Hello, my name is Erin.
I’m a professional copy editor who shares writing tips for the real world on this channel
and on my blog at erinwrightwriting.com.
Today’s tutorial shows you how to create a nonbreaking dash in Microsoft Word.
A nonbreaking dash will keep words or numbers connected by an en dash, which is the shorter dash,
or an em dash, which is the longer dash, from separating at the end of a line.
If you would like to learn more about how to use dashes in your writing,
please see my blog posts titled "How to Use Em Dashes" and "How to Use En Dashes," linked below.
The steps for creating a nonbreaking dash can also be used for hyphens.
However, Word provides a built-in nonbreaking hyphen that is simpler to use than the process for dashes.
See the bonus section at the end of this tutorial for the steps to insert a nonbreaking hyphen.
I’ll be using Word for Office 365, which is currently the same as Word 2019.
The steps are the same in Word 2016, Word 2013, and Word 2010.
To begin creating a nonbreaking dash, place your cursor where you want the dash to appear.
Then, select the Insert tab in the ribbon, followed by Symbol in the Symbols group.
Next, select More Symbols from the drop-down menu.
Then, select the Special Characters tab in the Symbol dialog box.
From the Character menu, choose Em Dash or En Dash.
And then select the Insert button.
Now, go back up to the Characters menu and select No-Width Non Break.
The no-width non break is a special character that can create an unbreakable connection
between characters without creating a space between them.
Again, select the Insert button.
followed by the Close button to close the Symbol dialog box.
Notice that the no-width non break is invisible when your document’s formatting is hidden.
To view formatting, select the Home tab and then select the Show/Hide button,
which looks like the paragraph symbol.
The no-width non break symbol now looks like an open rectangle with a smaller, gray rectangle in the center.
When you’re ready, you can select the Show/Hide button again to hide formatting.
Now we’ll quickly insert a nonbreaking hyphen.
To begin, place your cursor after the word, prefix, or number
to which you want to attach the nonbreaking hyphen.
Then, select the Insert tab in the ribbon and Symbol in the Symbols group.
Select More Symbols from the drop-down menu.
And then select the Special Characters tab in the Symbol dialog box.
Next, choose Nonbreaking Hyphen from the Character menu.
Then, select the Insert button, followed by the Close button.
Finally, type the word or number that you want to attach to the other side of the hyphen.
The nonbreaking hyphen will look like a normal hyphen.
However, if you turn on Show/Hide as we did in the previous section,
the nonbreaking hyphen will look slightly longer and thinner than a normal hyphen.
You can also insert a nonbreaking hyphen without opening the Symbol dialog box
by using the keyboard shortcut Control plus Shift plus hyphen.
The companion blog post for this video along with many other writing tips appear on erinwrightwriting.com,
which is linked below.
Feel free to leave me a comment if there’s a specific topic related to Microsoft Word
or Adobe Acrobat that you would like me to address in the future.
And please subscribe to my channel and give this video a thumbs-up if you found it helpful.
Thank you so much for watching!