Different Word Count Options in MS Word

There are different Word count options in MS Word.

There are several ways to count the words automatically in a MS Word document.

Here is a sample MS Word document with body text, text box, end note, and footnotes:

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1) Count every word, EXCEPT textboxes, footnotes and endnotes

The first one is to count every word in the open document EXCEPT the words in the textboxes, footnotes and endnotes.

Go to the Review tab on your ribbon and click the Word Count button on the toolbar. It is 317.

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2) Count only those words with a SELECTION:

You can get the word count only within a selection you have made:

There are 52 words in the selection we’ve made.

3) Count words in body text, PLUS, text box, end notes, and all the footnotes:

When you select the “Include textboxes, footnotes, and endnotes” check-box in the Word Count dialog box, MS Word counts all the words in all the page components:

As expected, the word count is not up to 404.