How to Make a Table of Contents in Word 2010

This guide explains how to make a Table of Contents in Word 2010, with clear steps, practical tips, and important checks before you begin.

Step 1: Determine the level of each item corresponding to the Level in the table of contents. A big title is a chapter or a post corresponding to a level 1, a smaller title corresponds to a larger level. As the example here, there is no chapter name, only part 1 is small => part 2 corresponds to level 1, part 2.1 corresponds to level 2, part a corresponds to level 3:

Step 2: Determine the number of level levels to create in the table of contents. Default Word to 4 levels, if your document contains more than 4 levels you go to References -> Table of Content -> Custom Table of Contents:

A dialog box appears, enter the level level you want to display in Show Levels -> click OK:

Step 3: Assign titles in the document to their respective levels. For the process of choosing the level for each heading, you can conveniently go to View -> Outline:

The editing screen displays the Outline mode you select the title -> click the Outline level -> select the level that matches the title to create the table of contents:

Similarly, you assign the entire title to create a table of contents in the document with the corresponding levels:

Step 4: Number the page for the document before creating the table of contents to avoid page number errors. Go to the Insert tab -> in Header & Footer section select Page Number -> select page numbering style -> choose numbering position:

Step 5: Create an automatic table of contents. Go to References tab -> Table of Content -> select the type of display of the table of contents you want to create:

The result is that you have created the table of contents automatically, to move to any item in the document, you just need to hold Ctrl key -> left click on the item you want to move to:

Step 6: Customize the table of contents

- Update the table of contents: After creating the table of contents, but you need to edit the content in the document related to the table of contents creation, to update the change, select the table of contents -> click Update Table :

The dialog box appears with the following two options:

- Update page numbes only: Only update the page number in the table of contents.

- Update entire table: Update all contents in the table of contents.

Finally, click OK:

- In case you want to delete the table of contents, click the arrow in the table of contents -> select Remove Table of Contents

Also note that when creating the table of contents does not allow to move to the items using the Ctrl key and click you on the File tab -> Option:

The window appears under Advanced -> select Use CTRL + Click to follow hyperlink -> click OK:

Above is a detailed guide on how to create a table of contents in Word 2010, with the following versions such as 2013 and 2016 you perform the same operation. Good luck!