Turn Smart Quotes Off in Microsoft Word
Someone on your team copies a formula out of a Word doc, pastes it into Excel, and gets an error. They check it twice. It looks perfect. The culprit is a pair of tiny curly quotation marks Word swapped in without asking.
Those are smart quotes, and Microsoft Word turns them on by default. Most of the time they’re harmless. When text leaves Word and lands in a spreadsheet, a website, a script, or a data import, they can quietly break things. Here’s what smart quotes are, how to turn smart quotes off in Word on Windows and Mac, and how to clean up the ones already in your documents.
What are smart quotes?
Smart quotes (also called curly quotes or typographer’s quotes) are the angled quotation marks and apostrophes you see in books and printed materials: “like this” and it’s. Straight quotes are the plain vertical marks on your keyboard: “like this” and it’s.
As you type, Word automatically replaces straight quotes with smart quotes because they look more polished on the page. For letters, proposals, and anything headed to a printer, that’s a nice touch.
The trouble starts when your text goes somewhere that expects the plain version:
- Excel formulas. Excel needs straight quotes around text in a formula, so a curly one turns a working formula into an error.
- Code, scripts, and command lines. A single curly quote in a PowerShell command or a line of HTML is enough to stop it cold.
- Data imports and CSV files. Systems that import customer lists, product data, or orders may read curly quotes as unexpected characters.
- Websites and older systems. When a system and your document disagree about character encoding, a smart apostrophe can show up as gibberish like ’ instead of the mark you typed.
In other words, smart quotes are great for reading and not so great for machines. If your team regularly moves text out of Word into other systems, straight quotes save a lot of head-scratching.
How to Turn Off Smart Quotes in Word for Windows
These steps work in Word for Microsoft 365, Word 2024, Word 2021, and older desktop versions back to Word 2010.
- Open Word and select File, then Options.
- Select Proofing in the left pane.
- Select AutoCorrect Options.
- Open the AutoFormat As You Type tab.
- Under Replace as you type, uncheck “Straight quotes” with “smart quotes”.
- For good measure, open the AutoFormat tab and uncheck the same box there too.
- Select OK, then OK again.
That’s it. From now on, Word leaves your straight quotes alone.
How to Turn Off Smart Quotes in Word for Mac
- With Word open, go to the Word menu and choose Preferences (called Settings in newer versions).
- Under Authoring and Proofing Tools, select AutoCorrect.
- Open the AutoFormat As You Type tab.
- Uncheck “Straight quotes” with “smart quotes”.
- Close the window. The change saves automatically.
Need a Straight Quote Just Once?
If you’d rather keep smart quotes on for everyday writing, there’s a quick workaround. Type the quotation mark, and the moment Word curls it, press Ctrl+Z (or Command+Z on a Mac). Word undoes the automatic change and leaves the straight quote in place. One keystroke, no settings menu required.
How to Replace Smart Quotes Already in a Document
Turning the setting off only affects what you type next. Any smart quotes already in the document stay curly. Here’s the cleanup trick:
- Turn off smart quotes using the steps above.
- Press Ctrl+H (or Command+Shift+H on a Mac) to open Find and Replace.
- Type a double quotation mark in both the Find what and Replace with boxes.
- Select Replace All.
- Repeat with a single quotation mark (apostrophe) in both boxes.
It looks like you’re replacing a character with itself, and in a way you are. With smart quotes off, Word swaps every curly quote for its straight twin. Microsoft walks through the same approach in its smart quotes support article.
What About Outlook and PowerPoint?
The same setting lives in other Office apps, so if your team copies text out of emails or slides, it’s worth changing there too.
- PowerPoint for Windows: go to File > Options > Proofing > AutoCorrect Options, open the AutoFormat As You Type tab, and uncheck the smart quotes box.
- Classic Outlook for Windows: go to File > Options > Mail > Editor Options > Proofing > AutoCorrect Options, then uncheck the same box on the AutoFormat As You Type tab.
- New Outlook and Outlook on the web: formatting settings live under the Editor menu instead. Microsoft explains where to find them in its guide to autocorrect and auto format options in Outlook.
Five minutes in the settings menu now saves a lot of “why won’t this work?” later.
LG Networks Can Help Your Team Get More Out of Microsoft 365
Smart quotes are a small thing. But small settings like this add up, and they tend to surface at the worst moment: right before a deadline, in the middle of a data import, or when a client is waiting on a file.
That’s where a good IT partner earns its keep. LG Networks provides IT support in Dallas and across DFW, including Microsoft 365 setup and management, a 24/7 helpdesk your team can call with questions big and small, and 24/7 monitoring that keeps your systems running in the background. When we set up Office for a business, we configure it around how your people actually work, so fixes like this one happen once instead of on every desk.
How much time would your team get back if the little tech annoyances just stopped?
Take the first step. We’ve got you covered.
Have questions about Microsoft 365 or managed IT services in Dallas, TX? Contact Us Today.
