How to use icons in Microsoft Word 2013

This article details how to insert icons, assign or change shortcuts with icons and how to use special icons . in Microsoft Word 2013 documents.

Microsoft Word provides hundreds of icons that are not on the keyboard for you to insert into the document. For example, you can insert decimals (½), degree symbol (°), pi (π), or currency symbols, such as pounds (£). There are many symbols and characters for each font set.

To insert an icon into a Word 2013 document, place the cursor where you want to insert the icon and press the 'Insert' tab on the Ribbon.

Click the 'Symbol' button in the 'Symbols' section of the 'Insert' tab and select 'More Symbols'.

In the 'Symbol' dialog box, select the font set with the icon you want to insert from the 'Font' drop-down list.

You can group icons by selecting an option from the 'Subset' drop-down list.

Select the icon to use by clicking on it and clicking 'Insert'.

Note : The ' Symbol' dialog box does not close automatically when you insert an icon. This allows you to insert multiple icons at once. If you have finished inserting, click the 'Close' button .

The icons you just inserted into your Word document are listed in 'Recently used symbols' section , which is especially convenient when you want to insert an icon multiple times.

Microsoft Word assigns each icon a shortcut (shortcut). However, it is not easy to remember all these shortcuts. You can assign icons you often use easy-to-remember shortcuts.

There are two ways to assign shortcuts to icons:

Method 1: Right-click a section title on any tab in the Ribbon and select 'Customize the Ribbon' from the menu that appears.

On the 'Customize Ribbon' screen on the 'Word Options' dialog box, click the 'Customize' button near 'Keyboard shortcuts' under the list of commands on the left.

On the 'Customize Keyboard' dialog box, scroll down to the bottom of the ' Categories' list and select 'Common Symbols'. Then, select the icon you want to assign the shortcut to the 'Common Symbols' list. Click on the edit box for 'Press new shortcut key' and enter the shortcut you want to assign. Click the 'Assign' button , so the shortcut has been added to the 'Current keys' box. Click 'Close' to close the dialog box.

Click 'OK' on the Word Options dialog box to close.

Method 2: You can also assign a shortcut to an icon from the 'Symbol' dialog box by clicking the 'Shortcut Key' button .

This gives you direct access to the ' Customize Keyboard' dialog box, where you can assign a shortcut to the selected icon in the above manner. For this way, the only icon in the 'Customize Keyboard' dialog box is the selected icon in the 'Symbol' dialog box .

When you have assigned the shortcut to the icon, click 'Close'.

The " Symbol" dialog box also allows you to insert many other characters and symbols using the 'Special Characters' tab , such as dashes. To insert a special character, select the character you want to insert and click 'Insert'.

You can also assign or change shortcuts that come with special characters by using the 'Shortcut Key' button .

And assign the shortcut in the ' Customize Keyboard ' dialog box as described above.