How to overline text in word

@howtogeek
Updated July 11, 2017, 10:08pm EDT

Underlining is a common task in Word, and easily done, but what if you need to overline (also called overscore or overbar), some text? Overlining is common in scientific fields, but there are various reasons for overlining text. However, Word doesn’t make it easy.

You can apply overlining to your text in Word using a field code or the equation editor, or you can add a paragraph border to the top of the text.

Using a Field Code

First, we’ll show you how to use a field code to apply overlining to text. Open an existing or new document in Word and place the cursor where you want to put the text with overlining. Press “Ctrl + F9” to insert field code brackets, which are highlighted in gray. The cursor is automatically placed in between the brackets.

Enter the following text between the brackets.

NOTE: There is a space between “EQ” and “x” and between “x” and “t()”. “EQ” is the field code used to create an equation and the “x” and “to” are switches used to format the equation or text. There are other switches you can use in the EQ field code, including ones that apply bottom, right, left, and box borders to the equation or text.

Put the cursor between the parentheses and enter the text you want to overline.

To display this as text rather than a field code, right-click anywhere in the field code and select “Toggle Field Codes” from the popup menu.

The text you entered into the field code displays with a line above it. When the field code displays as normal text, you can highlight it and apply various formatting to it, such as font, size, bold, color, etc.

NOTE: To display the field code again, simply right-click in the text and select “Toggle Field Codes” again. When you put the cursor in text generated from using a field code, the text is highlighted in gray, just like the field code.

If you want the line to extend beyond either end of the text, add spaces when entering the text into the field code. This is useful for creating lines with names under them for signing official documents.

Field codes work in all versions of Word, for both Windows and Mac.

Using the Equation Editor

You can also apply overlining to text using the equation editor. To do so, click the “Insert” tab in your Word document.

In the “Symbols” section of the “Insert” tab, click “Equation”.

The “Design” tab under “Equation Tools” displays. In the “Structures” section, click “Accent” to access various accents you can apply to the top of the text in the equation. There are two different accents you can use. Select either the “Bar” under “Accents” on the drop-down menu…

…or select the “Overbar” under “Overbars and Underbars”. The “Overbar” produces a slightly longer line above the text than the “Bar”.

The selected accent displays over the small dotted box in the equation object.

To enter your text, click on the dotted box to select it.

Type your text into the dotted box. The line extends to cover the text as you type.

Click outside of the equation object to view the finished “equation”, or overlined text.

Notice that when entering a hyphenated word or phrase into an equation in the Equation Editor, such as “How-To Geek”, there are spaces before and after the dash. That’s because it’s an equation and Word is treating the dash as a minus sign between two operands. If you would rather not have those spaces (or if you don’t have the Equation Editor installed), the first method above, or the following method, may work better for you.

Adding a Paragraph Border

Applying an overline to text can also be accomplished using paragraph borders. Type the text you want to overline into your Word document and make sure the “Home” tab is active on the ribbon bar. Click the down arrow on the “Borders” button in the “Paragraph” section of the “Home” tab.

Select “Top Border” from the drop-down menu.

The line above the paragraph extends from the left margin to the right margin. However, you can adjust the indents for that paragraph to shorten the line. To do this, you must make the ruler visible. Click the “View” tab.

In the “Show” section of the “View” tab, click the “Ruler” check box so there is a check mark in the check box.

To change the indents for the paragraph, put the cursor in the paragraph and put your mouse over one of the indent markers on the ruler. For this example, we’ll make the “Right Indent” bigger, shortening the line from the right.

NOTE: To move the left indent, put your mouse over the small box directly under the two small triangles on the left side of the ruler to move the triangles together. Do NOT move the triangles separately.

Click and drag the indent until the line is the length you want.

Release the mouse button when you’re done moving the indent. The line is now shorter.

Until Microsoft adds this capability as a regular feature, these methods provide ways around the limitation. They may not be as easy as highlighting text and clicking a single button, or pressing a shortcut key, but they’ll work in a pinch.

In Word document, we can quickly and easily insert an underline to a word or sentence, but, have you ever tried to insert a line over or above texts? This article, I will talk about how to put a bar or line over texts in Word document.

To insert a line over text, the normal Equation feature can help you to solve it, please do as this:

1. Click where you want to insert an over-line text, and then click Insert > Equation > Insert New Equation, see screenshot:

2. Then, under the Design tab of Equation Tools group, click Accent drop down, and then select Overbar in the Overbars and Underbars section, see screenshot:

3. And then, a bar appears on top of the blank space for writing the equation, then, you should click to select the box, and enter the text that you want to use. And you will get the text with over-line as following screenshot shown:

The Field function also can do you a favor, please do with below steps:

1. Click where you want to insert the over-line text, and then click Insert > Quick Parts > Field, see screenshot:

2. In the Field dialog box, select Eq from the Field names list box, and then click Equation Editor button, see screenshot:

3. And then, a text box is displayed where you can type text or equation, then click Underbar and overbar templates box in the Equation toolbar, and then select the overbar icon, see screenshot:

4. And then, you can type anything in the box over which you want to add a bar. At last, close the toolbar after finishing typing the text, see screenshot:

Here is another simple method, which also can help you, insert the over-line to text, please do as this:

1. Press Ctrl +F9 to insert the field code brackets, see screenshot:

2. Then, enter EQ x to() text between the brackets, and then type the text that you want to add the overbar into the parentheses, see screenshot:

3. And then, right click the field code, choose Toggle Field Codes from the right-click menu, now, the text you entered into the field code is displayed with a line above it, see screenshot:

Note: To display the field code to change the text, you just need to right-click in the text and select Toggle Field Codes again.

I have to fill out an application developed in Word. It’s not a true form; the person who developed it just typed a bunch of underscores. So, when I type in my information, everything moves to the right which then moves the next item to a new line. Is there a way to enter the information so that it does not add to the length of the line but simply replaces the underscores? Here’s an example of what I have to fill in.

Name ________________________________ Email: ___________________________________________________

Retaining the line created by the underscores is not a requirement.

I need something easy. In the “old days” you simply toggled the “insert” key.

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In Word 2010, you have to click Insert on the status bar to change it to Overtype. You would also need to press Ctrl+U to turn on Underline formatting for the text that you are typing into the underlined space.

Depending upon how the lines were created, the underlined for text that you type may not line up exactly with the original line.

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To create a simple form, you can use table cells. Remove all borders except for the bottom ones.

This was good information to know, but didn’t really apply.

I had received a document from another agency and was trying to fill it out. The next time I need to create a quick form I’ve got the answer waiting for me. Thanks for jumping in and trying to help.,

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In Word 2010, you have to click Insert on the status bar to change it to Overtype. You would also need to press Ctrl+U to turn on Underline formatting for the text that you are typing into the underlined space.

Depending upon how the lines were created, the underlined for text that you type may not line up exactly with the original line.

This is getting closer. What I found was that Microsoft decided to disable the insert key by default. To fix it once and forget it forever, go into “Word Options” >>”Advanced” Tab >>”Editing Options” header >> put a check mark in the box “Use the Insert Key to control overtype mode”.

Thanks to Yves Dhondt for his response to a similar question back in May 2010

If the lines are important you’ll need to know they were created. If they just repeated underscore, I found it easiest to delete their “underscores, enter my information, then use the “underline” function to put them back

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While not quite as easy as writing a signature on a paper contract, Microsoft Word allows you to graphically sign above lines with its the built-in drawing tools. This can save you the trouble of having to print out a document and keep paper copies on file. It also allows you to initial or sign a document and then send it back electronically.

Step 1

Open the Word document and scroll to the line you want to write above. You may need to zoom in on the line if it’s small.

Step 2

Click on the “Insert” tab and then click the “Text Box” button, which is in the “Text” part of the ribbon. A menu window will come up. Select “Simple Text Box.”

Step 3

Drag your mouse cursor to make a text box over the signature line. Click inside the box to make it the active text entry field.

Step 4

Click on the “Insert” tab, and then go to the “Shapes” button in the “Illustrations” area. Select the “Scribble” tool, which is located under the “Lines” heading. Click it and draw your signature with the mouse, holding down the left mouse button the entire time you’re drawing it.

Step 5

Click the orange Text Box Tools tab. Click the “Shape Outline” menu and choose “No Outline.” Click the “Shape Fill” menu and choose “No Fill.” This sets the text box’s border to be invisible and keeps your signature above the line.

• Dickinson College: Microsoft Word 2010 — Adding Text Box Quotes & Sidebars
• University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire: Drawing in Office 2007

Ken Burnside has been writing freelance since 1990, contributing to publications as diverse as “Pyramid” and “Training & Simulations Journal.” A Microsoft MVP in Excel, he holds a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Alaska. He won the Origins Award for Attack Vector: Tactical, a board game about space combat.

I am converting a technical document from paper to Word 2007 format. I scanned the doc, OCR’d it, and now am cleaning up the mayhem caused by OCR software that doesn’t recognize some technical symbols.

The document contains a large number of signal names that must be “overlined” – just like underlining, except above the characters instead of below them.

The signal names are groups of 2 or more alphanumeric characters, such as GND12, or PULSEDWN, and would have an unbroken line starting just above the 1st character in the name and running to just above the last character.

Is there any easy way to do this?

Use the following field construction where you use Ctrl+F9 to create the field delimiters

The following code in a macro will create such a field construction for the selected text:

Dim str As String
Dim fld As Field
str = Selection.Text
Set fld = ActiveDocument.Fields.Add(Selection.Range, wdFieldEmpty, “EQ Xto(” & str & “)”)
With fld.Code
.Text = Replace(.Text, ” * MERGEFORMAT “, “”)
End With
— Hope this helps.

Doug Robbins – Word MVP,
dkr[atsymbol]mvps[dot]org
Posted via the Community Bridge

“Lori L.” wrote in message news:*** Email address is removed for privacy ***.

I am converting a technical document from paper to Word 2007 format. I scanned the doc, OCR’d it, and now am cleaning up the mayhem caused by OCR software that doesn’t recognize some technical symbols.

The document contains a large number of signal names that must be “overlined” – just like underlining, except above the characters instead of below them.

The signal names are groups of 2 or more alphanumeric characters, such as GND12, or PULSEDWN, and would have an unbroken line starting just above the 1st character in the name and running to just above the last character.

How do I type over an underscore, in a word document, without separating the underscore. I’m sure it’s a macro, but I’m not sure how to do this. Can someone give me some direction? Thanks.

Someone in my company sent me a word document like this and I noticed an exclamation mark on the file icon. Please help, I can use this in many things I do.

If a “fill-in-the-blanks” line has been created using underscore characters, the only way you can even sort of type on the line is to enable Overtype mode (usually you can do this by pressing the Insert key, but this function is disabled by default in Word 2010, so you’ll have to click Insert on the status bar to change it to Overtype). Then press Ctrl+U to turn on Underline formatting. The underlined text in most fonts won’t exactly match the underline characters, however.

The exclamation point indicates that the document (or template) is macro-enabled; it will have the file extension .docm (document) or .dotm (template). So your hunch about macros may be correct, but if the sender of the document has not provided any instructions on how to use the form, you’re on your own. There are better ways to create fillable forms, using form fields or content controls.

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