Quickly turn text into a Microsoft Word table
It is possible to convert text from a Word document into a table.
However, to do so requires the text to be correctly laid out – if it is not, it is worth a few minutes work to reformat the text so it can be easily converted to a table.
To convert the text each column’s content needs to be separated by a single tab and you need to have a paragraph marker at the end of each line. To check your text is correctly formatted, click the Home tab and click the Show/Hide¶ button to see the tab marks in the document (they are small right pointing arrows).
Make sure there is only one tab marker between each item in the list. If you don’t have data for a particular column add two tab marks to indicate that one column is empty.
Click the Show/Hide¶ button again when you are done.
Select the list and choose Insert > Table > Convert Text To Table.
Word should automatically suggest the correct number of columns. From the Separate text at options select Tabs, set the AutoFit behavior to AutoFit to contents if the items are short like ours are and click Ok.
The text will be automatically placed in a new table ready for you to continue to work on it.
