Changing the Comments Balloon Color in Microsoft Word 2003
Recently I was reviewing a report in Microsoft Word and adding comments and suggestions. The comment balloons were blue but I wanted to change them to red. It took me a while to figure out how this is done, but it’s easy once you know how.
From the top toolbar in Word, click on Tools -> Options -> Track Changes tab. Then under the Markup section, simply change the Comments color to whatever you desire. See the screen shot below:
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Thanks a bunch. This was really helpful.
Comment by JayT — May 16, 2008 @ 9:00 amhi,
if we so as above, all the comments will be change to the new color. but i need to change some of the comments in to red and some of them to green in the same document.
is there a way to do so.
please let me know if there is an easy way.
waiting for the reply
thanks
Comment by pooh — May 22, 2008 @ 9:36 pmthanks. why can’t word help be that straightforward!
Comment by jo — May 27, 2008 @ 1:47 amThank you so much! Not knowing how to change the color was really bugging me.
Comment by Elizabeth — August 8, 2008 @ 2:53 pmThanks. i read Word help and looked at the instructions but didn’t understand it. thanks for making it plain.
Comment by woullard lett — September 28, 2008 @ 6:41 amSorry, I’m afraid it is not possible to change certain comments, only all comments. U may wish to try changing the font or highlighting it. I love word 2007 but its still missing a few features.
P.S. the quick access toolbar can help you speed things up rather than having to click through the ribbons if its something like cropping
Comment by Zte — October 12, 2008 @ 11:03 amthanks alot
Comment by Junfa — February 3, 2009 @ 5:15 amI’ve been researching the same issue and found that you can actually have different colors when using comments. The feature is available since at times it is possible that different people may review a document and this helps identify reviewers by color…
Comment by Edgar — March 11, 2009 @ 9:35 amYou’d have to go to Tools/Options/USER INFORMATION, then change anything here, even 1 character will be sufficient. Then go back to Tools/Options/TRACK CHANGES, and here instead of choosing a specific color, choose BY AUTHOR… close out of Word fully, then open it again and go back to your document. Your new comments should be in a totally different color … btw, Word chooses the colors randomly… i’m still researching this to see if there’s a way around the randomness…
Cheers!
Here we go… i found great answers to your question -
the answers were lifted from here in case you want to read the entire article…it’s worth it
:http://www.shaunakelly.com/word/trackchanges/HowTrackChangesWorks.html
Q: How does Word choose which colour to allocate to which author?
You can choose to display tracked changed in any of 16 colours. But if you want Word to display different reviewers’ revisions in different colours (that is, if you choose to display using the “By Author” color), then Word only provides 8 colours with which to distinguish authors.
In theory, Word allocates colours to reviewers in the following order: red, blue, green, violet, dark red, teal, dark yellow and grey. For the 9th and subsequent reviewers of a document, Word cycles through the colours again. But in practice, as reviewers come and go (as their revisions are accepted or rejected), the allocation of colours to reviewers ends up, in effect, random.
You can test this out by changing the user’s name at Tools > Options > User Information, turning on tracked changes and making some changes to your document.
Q: Can I allocate a specific colour to each author?
No. Word allocates colours to authors (who are also called reviewers).
Comment by Edgar — March 11, 2009 @ 10:04 amThank you! It was amazing that I could not find the answer in Word 2007. It’s a shame when you can’t get a direct answer from the distributor.
Comment by Catherine — March 16, 2009 @ 12:42 pmHelpful! Thanks so much! everything else I found online was not helpful at all.
Comment by Anonymous — March 24, 2009 @ 1:13 pmthanks for the piece of advice. It’s a shame the official office helpdesk says nothing about that feature, it is so helpful when editing for a final version! Thanks a lot!
Comment by Samantha — March 25, 2009 @ 4:29 pmVery helpfull - I have a document with an issue in this: all is set to color the changes by Author (comments too), but when we look at the comments, they are alwys red, and the author names are [A1], [A2],…
When I check the user information, the initials of the user are filled out.
When I check the properties of the document: last modified by: nothing is displayed.
Is this document corrupt or am I overseeing something ?”\
Thanks!
Comment by Mario — April 1, 2009 @ 1:54 amThis was very helpful-thank you!!! Cute pup!
Comment by Kristen — April 13, 2009 @ 11:23 amThanks!!
Comment by Melanie from Holland — May 6, 2009 @ 5:19 amI was really struggling with it.
This was very helpful!
thanks! I was so sick of that color! haha
Comment by mbird — May 14, 2009 @ 1:13 pmThank you! I am much happier with bright green and had no idea how to make that happen.
Comment by Kelsey — January 31, 2010 @ 2:43 pmI asked my friend to edit an article with track changes on. Now it shows his name in reviewers comment. I want my name to display on all the changes that he made. Is it possible, how?
Comment by samuel — February 26, 2010 @ 1:16 amPS. i am working on word 2003
Comment by samuel — February 26, 2010 @ 1:18 amVery helpful!
Comment by dglp — April 28, 2010 @ 5:10 amNow I don’t have to mark student’s work with red!
Works with Word2K.
Thanks.. I must be going blind.. Using 2007. But your message put me in the right place.
Comment by WLN — June 17, 2010 @ 6:07 pm