Last updated: March 15, 2017

Everyone has different needs when it comes to working with Microsoft Word 2010, but sometimes those needs might extend into areas that you would not expect. However, Microsoft gives you a lot of ways to customize their popular word-processing program, and changing the units of measurement is one of the options that is available for you. So if you find yourself in a situation where you need to display your margins as centimeters instead of inches, then you can make that adjustment on the Word Options menu.

1. Margins in Word 2016 documents create the text area on a page, left, right, top, and bottom. They provide room between the text and the page’s edge, which keeps the text from leaking out of a document and all over the computer. Word automatically sets page margins at 1 inch from every page edge.
2. The display language in Word governs the ribbon, buttons, tabs, and other controls. Normally, Word defaults to the language of the operating system. As a rule, you should use Windows to install language files rather than rely on an application like Word to do it for you.

If you are simply looking to figure out what a one inch margin is in centimeters, then the conversion is 1 inch = 2.54 centimeters. But constantly remembering that conversion metric can be tricky, and it is very easy to accidentally assume that you are working in one unit of measurement, when the other is the one for which the values are being displayed. So if you want to use centimeters for your margin values in Word 2010, then follow the guide below.

Not all documents fit inside Word’s default one-inch margin between the text and the edge of the page. To change the margins in your Word documents, use one of several choices, from predefined margins that make it easy to apply a different size margin, to the customized margins adjustable to fit your needs.

Change Word 2010 Unit of Measurement for Margins

Change Margins In Word Mac

Whether you simply prefer the metric system, or you are in a part of the world where you use centimeters instead of inches, then you can make that adjustment with Word 2010. You will notice that the menu where you make this adjustment also has a bunch of additional settings that you might prefer, so be sure to return to that menu in the future if you need to customize Word 2010 even further.

Step 1: Launch Microsoft Word 2010.

Step 2: Click the File tab at the top-left corner of the window.

Step 3: Click Options from the column at the left side of the Word 2010 window.

Step 4: Click Advanced in the column at the left side of the Word Options window that has opened above Word 2010.

Step 5: Scroll to the Display section in the main section of the window.

Step 6: Click the drop-down menu to the right of Show measurement in units of, then click the Centimeters option.

Step 7: Click the OK button at the bottom of the window.

Now that you have changed the margin units from inches to centimeters, you might be wondering how to actually change the margins on your document. You can do that with the steps below.

How to Change Margins in Word 2010

The steps below are going to show you how to change the margins for the current document in Word 2010. If you would like to change the margins for all of your documents, then find out how to change default margins in Word 2010 with this article. Otherwise, continue below.

Step 1: Open your document in Word 2010.

Step 2: Click the Page Layout tab at the top of the window.

Step 3: Click the Margins button in the Page Layout section of the ribbon.

Step 4: Select one of the default margin setting options, or click the Custom Margins option. If you selected one of the default margin options (Normal, Narrow, Moderate, Wide, Mirrored, or Office 2003 Default) then you are done. If you selected Custom Margins, continue below.

Adjust Margins Microsoft Word

Step 5: Adjust the margin settings in the Margins section at the top of the window.Click OK when you are done.

Microsoft Word Margin Bar

If you need to set your margins in centimeters, but are unable to change the unit of measurement from inches to centimeters, then some of the more common conversions are:

• 3 inches = 7.62 centimeters
• 2 inches = 5.08 centimeters
• 1.25 inches = 3.175 centimeters
• 1 inch = 2.54 centimeters
• .75 inches = 1.905 centimeters
• .50 inches =1.27 centimeters
• 1.1811 inches = 3 centimeters
• .787402 inches = 2 centimeters
• .393701 inches = 1 centimeter

Book Margins In Microsoft Word

Note that Word 2010 will only allow two decimal places for margins, however, so you would need to use 1.18 inches if you wanted 3 centimeter margins, or .79 inches if you wanted 2 centimeter margins.

Change Margins In Word On Mac

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