How to Print a Book from Microsoft Word

Have you ever wanted to print something in book format? Maybe you made a small pamphlet or maybe you designed a workbook for children in your church. Your project will look so much more finished and professional if it isn't just a packet of papers stapled in the corner. Microsoft Word allows users to print documents in book format. However, actually getting your work in book format can be confusing.

Let's assume you have already designed your project. Open the file in Microsoft Word. See the toolbar across the top? Its got FILE, EDIT, and VIEW in it. Using your mouse, left click on the word FILE. This will open a drop-down menu. Using your mouse, left click on the words PAGE SETUP. If you do not see PAGE SETUP in the drop-down menu, click on the arrow at the bottom of the menu. This should make the menu expand and show you more options. Left click on the words PAGE SETUP.

A dialogue box should appear on your screen. It will have three tabs - MARGINS, PAPER, and LAYOUT. The MARGINS tab will be on top. Stay in this tab. Under the MARGINS tab there should be four separate sections - MARGINS, ORIENTATION, PAGES, and PREVIEW. Under the PAGES section, you will see the words MULTIPLE PAGES followed by a white box with words in it. There will be an arrow next to the white box. Click on the arrow. This should open a drop-down menu. Move your mouse over the words BOOK FOLD and left click. In the PREVIEW section you should see the image change from showing one page to showing two.

After you change the MULTIPLE PAGES option to book fold, you will see the words SHEETS PER BOOKLET appear with another dropdown menu. This option allows you to change the number of pages that will be folded together. If your document is 50 pages or less, you can leave the PAGES PER BOOKLET option on ALL without having an issue. However, if you get too many sheets of paper in a booklet it becomes hard to fold, staple, and bind.

After you put your document in book fold style, each "page" will only be the size of half a sheet of paper. To avoid wasting a lot of space, you probably want to make the margins smaller. They will currently be set to whatever your default settings are. If you want to make your margins smaller, look at the section of the MARGINS tab called MARGINS. It should be at the top of the tab. You should see the words TOP, LEFT, GUTTER, RIGHT, BOTTOM, and GUTTER POSITION each followed by a number in a white box. Click in the white box next to the word TOP and use the BACKSPACE button on your computer to delete the number showing there. In its place type ".5" to set the size of the margins. You can set the margins to any size you would like, but I find .5" margins work well for book fold style documents. Change the numbers in the boxes for LEFT, RIGHT, and BOTTOM to .5 as well. You should see the picture in the PREVIEW section at the bottom of the tab change to make the margins smaller.

After you have made these changes, click the OK button at the bottom of the PAGE SETUP dialogue box. Your document will probably reformat itself. You may need to adjust where any images in your document are to account for this. I advise that you look over the entire document to be sure everything is where you want it before you proceed any farther.

If you want to put a cover on your booklet, now is the time to design it. Place your cursor at the beginning of your document before any of the text. In the top left of the screen, in the same bar you selected FILE from earlier, you will also see the word INSERT. Left click on it to open the dropdown menu. Click on the word BREAK. If you don't see BREAK, click the arrow at the bottom of the menu to get more options. A dialogue box will open. Make sure the black dot is in the circle next to the words PAGE BREAK. Click OK. You should now have a blank page at the beginning of your document. If you would like the page immediately inside the cover to be blank as well, repeat this process and add another page break. Place your cursor at the beginning of the first page and proceed to design your cover.

When you are finished designing your cover and you have checked that your document is properly formatted, click on FILE and then, in the drop down menu, click on PRINT. This will bring up the print window. Click on the PROPERTIES button in the top right hand corner of this box. This will open another window which differs depending on your printer. You need to select two-sided printing. On HP printers this may be under the FEATURES tab. If it is not, simply look through the options this window gives until you find two-sided printing or consult the owners' manual or help section for your printer. Once you have selected two-sided printing, you will need to click the APPLY button at the bottom of the window and then the OK button. This should bring you back to the print window. At this point, you can click the PRINT button. Your printer will print half the pages and then ask you to put the printed pages back in so it can print the other side. Instructions for this will be shown on your screen. Once both sides of your book are printed, you can staple it and you're finished!