How do I perfectly center a table on the page in Microsoft Word?

Question

I'm trying to insert a table in Microsoft Word. The entire page would consist of only this table, and I want it to be perfectly centered (both horizontally and vertically) on the page.

I'm not having any trouble getting it perfectly centered horizontally on the page, but I can't seem to get it to vertically center on the page. I have the page layout set to center vertically, but there's an extra line below the table that it won't let me remove, which is causing extra spacing below it.

I'm using Microsoft Word 2010. How can I get this table to center perfectly vertically and ignore this silly line that it insists on being there?

Answer 1

This should be pretty easy using the Table's properties. Try this:

1. Select your table, then right click.
2. On the Table Tab, Text Wrapping, choose Around. This should activate the Positioning option.
3. Select Positioning, and in the Table Positioning dialog box, set:
   • Horizontal Position = Center, Relative to Page
   • Vertical Position = Center, Relative to Page
   • Move with Text = unchecked
4. OK out of the dialog boxes and your Table should be centered. And it should stay centered regardless of changes to the Table (e.g. adding rows) or changes to surrounding text (including the extra, "silly line".

FWIW, you shouldn't even have to modify the Page Layout Property, this solution addresses the Table's location regardless of the Page's properties, so any text you may want to add could still be top justified.

Answer 2

Horizontal centering is fine as you stated, but IMO to achieve perfect vertical centering you'll have to place the table inside a text box, resize the text box to have the same margins on all 4 sides of the table, remove the text box border and finally center the text box on the page using either
Format / Position or Format / Align:

Answer 3

It's not really intuitive, but if you increase the font size of the extra line to 1000 pt it will force that line onto a second page leaving the table perfectly centered on the first page.

Another solution would be to simply insert a line before the table. If the font size of the line before the table is the same as the font size of the line after the table you should find that the table is perfectly centered vertically.