How to Delete a Blank Page in Microsoft Word

The Mystery of the Undeletable Page

Almost everyone who has used Microsoft Word for a significant amount of time has encountered the infamous “stubborn blank page.” You finish typing your essay or report, scroll to the bottom, and notice a completely empty white page sitting at the very end of your document. You place your cursor on the blank page and press the Backspace (or Delete) key repeatedly, but absolutely nothing happens. The page refuses to disappear.

This happens because Microsoft Word does not treat pages as physical, independent objects. A page only exists in Word if there is content forcing it to exist. Therefore, if you have a blank page that will not delete, it is not actually blank.

The page contains hidden formatting characters—usually a rogue paragraph break, an invisible page break, or a formatting table—that you simply cannot see with the naked eye. To delete the page, you must first reveal the invisible characters hiding on it.

Step 1: Reveal the Hidden Formatting Marks

To fix the problem, you need to turn on Word’s built-in “X-ray vision.”

1. Open your document in Microsoft Word.
2. Click on the Home tab at the top of the ribbon.
3. Look in the “Paragraph” section of the ribbon for a button that looks like a backward P (this is the Pilcrow symbol: ¶).
4. Click the ¶ button. (Alternatively, press Ctrl + Shift + 8 on your keyboard).

Your document will instantly fill with strange symbols. Do not panic; these will not print. You will now see a dot (·) between every word representing a space, and a paragraph mark (¶) at the end of every line representing a press of the Enter key.

Step 2: Identify and Delete the Culprit

Now, scroll down to the stubborn blank page. Because the hidden formatting marks are revealed, you will finally see exactly what is forcing the page to exist.

Scenario A: Empty Paragraph Marks

The most common cause is simply pressing the Enter key too many times. You will see a vertical list of empty paragraph marks (¶) running down the blank page.

The Fix: Click your mouse at the very bottom of the blank page, behind the last ¶ symbol, and press the Backspace key repeatedly until all the empty paragraph marks are deleted. Once the final mark is gone, the page will instantly vanish.

Scenario B: A Hidden Page Break

Sometimes, you accidentally inserted a hard manual break. You will see a dotted line with the words —–Page Break—– floating on the empty page.

The Fix: Click your mouse directly in front of the word “Page Break”, and press the Delete key (not Backspace) once. The break will disappear, and the page will close.

Scenario C: The Impossible Table

If your document ends with a table (like a resume or an invoice), Word has a deeply frustrating, hardcoded rule: it must place an empty paragraph mark (¶) immediately after every table. If your table ends at the very bottom edge of a page, that mandatory paragraph mark is forced onto a brand new blank page.

Because it is mandatory, you cannot delete this specific paragraph mark. Pressing Backspace will do nothing.

The Fix: You must make the invisible paragraph mark small enough to fit on the previous page.

1. Highlight the single paragraph mark (¶) on the blank page.
2. Look at the font size box in the top ribbon (it usually says 11 or 12).
3. Click inside the font size box, type the number 1, and press Enter.
4. The paragraph mark will shrink to a microscopic size. Because it is now tiny, it will easily fit on the previous page underneath the table, and the blank page will immediately disappear.

Step 3: Hide the Formatting Marks

Once the blank page is successfully deleted, you can turn off your X-ray vision.

1. Click the Home tab again.
2. Click the ¶ button to turn it off.
3. Your document will return to normal, and the stubborn page will be gone forever.