MS Word - Different First Page Setting Working on Header, but not page number

Question

I am using MS Word as part of the MS Office Professional Plus 2024 suite.

I have written a book in MS Word, but formatting trouble is preventing me from publishing.

• MS Word is showing page numbers on the chapter openings and blank pages.
• MS Word is showing headers on some of the blank pages

I go to Layout > Page Setup and select "Different Front Page."

• The headers disappear on the chapter openings, but the page numbers remain.
• SOME of the headers disappear on the chapter openings, but some remain. The page numbers remain on ALL the blank pages.

If I manually delete the unwanted information, the rest of the section headers/page numbers are also deleted.

Please help.

All Windows updates have been installed.
Rebooting doesn't work.
I copied the book into a new file–same result.

Answer 1

The AI's answer is more or less correct, if a bit jumbled (some of the numbered steps are merely introductions to the detailed steps that follow them). The key points are:

• Each section contains three headers and three footers (First Page, Odd Page, and Even Page, where the Odd Page ones are the default if the others aren't manually turned on). Each of the three headers is independent of the other headers with respect to contents and the "Link to Previous" setting. The same is true for the three footers.
• You said that when you turned on First Page headers, "The headers disappear on the chapter openings, but the page numbers remain." That implies that the page numbers were present (just not displayed) in the First Page header before you turned on Different First Page; you had been looking at the Odd Page header before that. You should be able to delete that page number to empty out the First Page header, without affecting the page numbers in the rest of the pages in the section (those in the Odd Page and, if you use the Even Page header, there also).
• If your blank pages are ones at the ends of sections, they may occur because you used Odd Page section breaks, so Word is adding those blanks to force the next section to start on an odd-numbered page. Even then, nothing should appear in the headers of those pages. There is a different way to make those pages blank, by creating a field that will suppress those page numbers, as described in https://wordmvp.com/FAQs/TblsFldsFms/InsEvnPgEndChap.htm.

If you still need more help, create a document that illustrates the problem (it doesn't have to be actual text from your book, as long as the layout is the same), store it on a service such as OneDrive or DropBox, and post a sharing link here so we can download it.

Answer 2

The behavior is controlled by sections and by the “Different First Page” setting in the header/footer, not in Layout > Page Setup alone. To hide headers and/or page numbers on chapter-opening pages and blank pages without affecting the rest of the document, use section breaks and header/footer settings as follows.

1. Ensure chapter openings start a new section
2. Place the cursor at the end of the text before a chapter-opening page.
3. Go to Layout > Breaks > Next Page to insert a section break before each chapter-opening page.
   • If there is already a simple page break, remove it and replace it with a Next Page section break.
4. Turn off header/footer linkage for each new section
5. Double-click in the header (or footer) area on a chapter-opening page to open Header & Footer tools.
6. On the Header & Footer tab, select Link to Previous to turn it off.
   • This breaks the connection so changes in this section do not affect earlier sections.
7. Repeat for the footer if needed (page numbers are usually in the footer).
8. Use “Different First Page” to remove header/page number on the first page of each section
9. With the cursor still in the chapter-opening page header or footer, check Different First Page.
   • This applies to the first page of that section only.
10. On that first page (it will show “First Page Header” / “First Page Footer”), delete the header content and/or the page number.
11. Leave the header/footer content in the second page of the section; that content will be used for all non-first pages in that section.
12. Remove page numbers from the very first page of the document (if needed)
13. Go to Insert > Header or Footer > Edit Header or Edit Footer.
14. Select Different First Page.
15. On the first page, select the page number and press Delete.
16. If the second page should show as page 1, go to Insert > Page Number > Format Page Numbers, and under Page numbering set Start at to 0.
17. Handling blank pages that show headers/page numbers

• If a blank page is the first page of a section, use Different First Page in that section and delete the header/footer content on that first page only.
• If a blank page is in the middle of a section and must remain blank:
  1. Insert a Next Page section break before the blank page.
  2. Insert another Next Page section break after the blank page.
  3. In the middle (blank) section, turn off Link to Previous for header and footer, then remove the header/footer (or just the page number) in that section.

6. If deleting content still removes it in other sections

• Verify for each section:
  • There is a Next Page section break at the chapter start/blank page.
  • Link to Previous is turned off in both header and footer for that section.
  • Different First Page is enabled where only the first page of the section should differ.

These steps ensure:

• Chapter-opening pages can have no header and/or no page number.
• Blank pages can be completely blank.
• Other pages in the same document keep their headers and page numbers.

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References:

• Change or delete a header or footer on a single page
• Start page numbering later in your document
• Customize page numbers and their formats in different Word document sections
• Add page numbers to a header or footer in Word