Staring at a bright white screen for hours while writing or editing documents can cause significant eye strain and fatigue. To alleviate this, Microsoft Word includes a comprehensive Dark Mode feature that changes the entire user interface—including the ribbon, sidebars, and the document page itself—to a darker colour palette.
Unlike simply lowering your monitor’s brightness, enabling the dark theme in Word provides a high-contrast, visually comfortable environment that is especially beneficial when working in low-light conditions.
How to Turn On Dark Mode in Microsoft Word
The process for enabling Dark Mode is straightforward, but the setting is located within the Office Account options rather than the standard document formatting menus.
- Open Microsoft Word. If you are already working on a document, click on File in the top-left corner of the ribbon.
- In the left-hand sidebar, click on Account (located near the bottom).
- Look for the section labelled Office Theme.
- Click the dropdown menu under Office Theme and select Black.
The entire Microsoft Word interface will immediately switch to a dark grey and black colour scheme. This setting will also apply to other Microsoft Office applications, such as Excel and PowerPoint, providing a consistent experience across the suite.
How to Keep the Document Page White
By default, selecting the Black theme will also turn the actual document page (the “paper” you type on) dark grey, with your text appearing as white. While this is excellent for reducing glare, it can sometimes make it difficult to visualise how the document will look when printed or shared with others.
If you prefer to have a dark user interface but keep the page canvas white, you can easily toggle the page colour independently:
- Return to your document view.
- Click on the View tab in the ribbon at the top of the window.
- In the “Dark Mode” group on the ribbon, click the Switch Modes button.
Clicking this button toggles the canvas colour between dark and white, allowing you to quickly switch back and forth without having to navigate back to the Account settings menu.
How to Sync Word with Your Windows System Theme
If you regularly switch between light and dark modes on your Windows PC depending on the time of day, you might want Microsoft Word to change automatically along with your operating system.
To do this, follow the exact same steps to access the Office Theme dropdown menu under File > Account. Instead of selecting “Black”, select Use system setting.
When this option is selected, Microsoft Word will constantly monitor your Windows Personalisation settings. If your Windows 11 system is set to Dark Mode, Word will be dark. If you switch Windows to Light Mode during the day, Word will automatically brighten to match.