How do you make internal links in Microsoft Word?

Question

What I'm asking is, how do you create links in a Word document, to other parts of the same document?

An example would be having a table of contents on the first page that lets you click on each topic, then sends you to the page of the document that contains it.

Answer 1

In general, you can link to a point in the document by setting a bookmark there, then inserting a hyperlink to the bookmark at the jump-from point.  To set a bookmark in Word 2002 (XP) and the adjacent versions:

1. Click exactly where you want the bookmark to be in the text.

2. Click the Insert->Bookmark menu item.

3. Give the bookmark a name.

4. Click Add.

To insert a hyperlink to a bookmark,

1. Click the Insert->Hyperlink menu item.

2. Click the Place In This Document panel.

But entries in Word's Tables of Contents are automatically linked to their sources.  These instructions are for Word 2002 (XP) but should be very close in adjacent versions.

1. Go to the point where you want the TOC to be, usually right before the first page.

2. Click on the Insert->Reference->Index and Tables menu item.

3. Select the Table of Contents tab.

4. Under Print Preview there are a few options you may wish to select or deselect, including one for tab leaders.

5. Click OK.

6. This will insert a table of contents field in your document, but since you don't have any entries, you'll see this message:

   Error! No table of contents entries found.

Not to worry.  To make entries, you'll have to use Heading styles. Heading 1, Heading 2, Heading 3 are by default collected for the Table of contents, but you can play around and get others also.   There's even a way of putting in entries that aren't flagged by style.  

The Table of Contents also doesn't continually update itself.  You have to tell it to whenever you want it to:

1. Right click in the table and select Update Field.

2. An Update Table of Contents dialog box will appear.

3. Click the Update Entire Field button.

4. Click OK.

You'll also probably want to put the Table in a separate section (use the Insert->Break menu item and select Section/Next page from the list).

And you may want to number the pages following the TOC starting at 1.

1. Click anywhere In the first section after the TOC.

2. Click the Insert->Page Numbers menu item.

3. In the Page Numbers dialog box, click the Format button.

4. Click Start At.

5. Click OK.  

6. DO NOT CLICK OK ON THE PAGE NUMBERS DIALOG BOX OR YOU'LL INSERT A DEFAULT PAGE NUMBER FIELD. Click CANCEL instead.

Hope that helps.