How to Do a Hanging Indent and First Line Indent in Word

To make a hanging indent in Word, select the paragraphs, open the Paragraph dialog from the small arrow in the Home tab's Paragraph group, and under Special choose Hanging, then set the depth in By (0.5" is the usual value). For a first line indent, choose First line in the same list. The keyboard shortcut for a hanging indent is Ctrl+T. Indents set this way are paragraph settings, so they stay put when fonts, margins or wording change. Lines pushed over with spaces or tabs do not, which is why contract drafts received from other companies so often fall apart the moment you edit a clause.

Left, First Line and Hanging: What Each Value Moves

The Indentation section of the Paragraph dialog holds three values. Mixing them up is the reason "I only wanted the first line indented, but the whole paragraph moved."

First line and hanging values are measured from the left indent. With Left at 0" and Hanging at 0.5", the first line starts at the margin and the rest of the paragraph starts half an inch in.

See it on the ruler

Turn on View > Ruler. Three markers sit at the left of the ruler: the top triangle is the first line indent, the bottom triangle is the hanging indent, and the small rectangle below it is the left indent, which moves both triangles together. Drag a marker to change it; hold Alt while dragging to see exact measurements.

The ruler only appears in Print Layout and Web Layout. If you are in Draft or Read Mode and cannot see the markers, switch back to Print Layout on the View tab.

How to Set a First Line or Hanging Indent

Microsoft's guide to adjusting indents and spacing uses the Paragraph dialog. Select the paragraphs, then select the dialog launcher at the bottom right of the Paragraph group on the Home tab.

First line indent

1. Select the paragraphs. For the whole document, press Ctrl+A.
2. On the Indents and Spacing tab, set Special to First line.
3. Enter a value in By, such as 0.3" or 0.5".
4. Check the Preview: only the first line should move. Select OK.

If the Preview shows the whole paragraph moving, you changed Left by mistake. Set it back to 0".

The Left and Right boxes on the Layout tab move the whole paragraph. They cannot set a first line or hanging indent, so use the Paragraph dialog for those.

Hanging indent

Microsoft's hanging indent article also calls it a second-line indent. It is the standard format for reference lists, glossaries and definition clauses, where the first line starts with a term and the explanation wraps underneath. Without it, wrapped lines sit flush at the margin and entries blur together, as in the reference list below.

Select the paragraphs, set Special to Hanging and enter the depth in By. The screenshot shows Left at 0" and a 0.2" hanging indent.

You can type units directly in any indent box: 1.5 cm or 12 pt are converted to your default unit. That helps when a customer's template specifies indents in centimeters.

Keyboard Shortcuts and Lists

These shortcuts come from Microsoft's keyboard shortcuts for Word:

• Ctrl+M / Ctrl+Shift+M: increase / decrease the left indent
• Ctrl+T / Ctrl+Shift+T: create / reduce a hanging indent
• Ctrl+Q: remove paragraph formatting (indents, spacing) back to the style's settings

Each press moves to the next default tab stop, 0.5" in a standard US template. For exact values, use the dialog. The Increase Indent and Decrease Indent buttons on the Home tab do the same as Ctrl+M and Ctrl+Shift+M.

Numbered and bulleted lists already hang

When you apply numbering or bullets, Word adds a hanging indent automatically so wrapped text lines up after the number. Pressing Ctrl+T on top of that widens the gap between number and text. To move a list, right-click it and choose Adjust List Indents, or define the number position and text indent per level in Define New Multilevel List.

👉 How to Change Line Spacing in Word, Paragraph Spacing Too

How to Remove Indents and Fix Common Problems

Remove an indent

The precise way: open the Paragraph dialog, set Left and Right to 0" and Special to (none). The fast way: Ctrl+Q, which returns the paragraph to its style's settings. Clear All Formatting on the Home tab removes indents along with character formatting, but it also resets the style to Normal, so use it only when you want a fully clean paragraph.

Pressing Tab creates an indent

When you press Tab at the start of a paragraph and Word sets a first line indent instead of inserting a tab, an AutoFormat option is on. Go to File > Options > Proofing > AutoCorrect Options > AutoFormat As You Type and clear Set left- and first-indent with tabs and backspaces.

Same value, different position

• Different from another document: indents are measured from the page margin. Check the margins first on the Layout tab or in Page Setup.
• Only inside tables: cell padding adds to the indent. Check cell margins in Table Properties.
• Some lines still misaligned: hidden spaces. Turn on Show/Hide ¶ (Ctrl+Shift+8); spaces show as dots and tabs as arrows.

Make it stick with styles

Put the first line value into the Normal style: right-click Normal in the Styles gallery, choose Modify > Format > Paragraph, and set the indent. Every paragraph in that style lines up at once, including new ones. For a few paragraphs, copy formatting with Ctrl+Alt+C and paste it with Ctrl+Alt+V in current Microsoft 365; Ctrl+Shift+V now pastes text only.

Worked Example: Cleaning Up a Supplier's Contract Draft

A buyer at Ridgeline Manufacturing receives a draft master supply agreement from Northgate Supply and needs it in the company's contract template before legal review. The template calls for body paragraphs with a 0.3" first line indent and definitions and schedule items with a 0.5" hanging indent. The draft pushes wrapped clause lines over with spaces, aligns definitions with tabs, and every line in the parts schedule starts at a different spot.

1. Reveal the hidden spacing. With Show/Hide ¶ on, most clauses start with four to six spaces and each definition has two tabs.
2. Strip leading spaces and tabs. In Find and Replace (Ctrl+H), find ^p^w and replace with ^p, then Replace All. ^w matches any run of spaces and tabs, so leading white space disappears from every paragraph after the first. Delete the first paragraph's spaces by hand.
3. Set the body indent in the style. Modifying Normal to a 0.3" first line indent aligns all 38 body clauses at once.
4. Hang the definitions. Select the nine definitions and set Hanging to 0.5". Where a definition uses "Term[tab]Meaning", also set a tab stop at 0.5" (Tabs button in the Paragraph dialog) so the first line's text lines up with the wrapped lines.
5. Turn the schedule into a real list. Delete the typed "1)" and "2)", apply numbering, and use Adjust List Indents to place it.
6. Leave table text alone. Paragraphs inside the pricing table get Left 0" because the cell padding already spaces them.
7. Check as PDF. Saving as PDF confirms the layout holds on a machine with different fonts.

The step that trips people is 4. Without the tab stop, the term's explanation starts at the default tab and the wrapped lines start at the hanging indent, a few characters apart.

Word for Mac and the Web

On Windows, Microsoft 365, Word 2024, Word 2021 and Word 2019 share the same Paragraph dialog. In Word for Mac, open it from Format > Paragraph or the Home tab; Command+T creates a hanging indent and Command+Shift+T removes it. In Word for the web, the dialog launcher in the Home tab's Paragraph group opens the same settings, with the Special list for first line and hanging indents.

FAQ

Q. What is the shortcut for a hanging indent in Word?

Ctrl+T on Windows, Command+T on Mac. Add Shift to reduce it. Each press moves by one default tab stop.

Q. Why does my whole paragraph move when I only want the first line indented?

You changed the Left value, or used Increase Indent. Set Left back to 0" and use Special > First line in the Paragraph dialog.

Q. How do I remove a hanging indent?

Set Special to (none) in the Paragraph dialog, or press Ctrl+Shift+T until the indent is gone. For numbered lists, use Adjust List Indents.

Q. Why doesn't the hanging indent line up with my list numbers?

Lists already include a hanging indent. Adding another one doubles it. Remove the extra value with Ctrl+Shift+T and set positions through Adjust List Indents.

Indents with inline AI

Stripping the spaces and tabs from contracts and agreements other companies send, and applying your template's indent values clause by clause, is work inline AI takes on. inline AI opens the received draft next to your company template, edits the Word document directly, and sets body text, definitions and schedules to their own values while leaving every clause's wording untouched.