Styles don't match formatting in a document I received

What are you trying to do, exactly? Which steps are you trying to follow?

Have you received a template file from the journal editor? In that case, create a new document based on the template and then bring in your existing content. This may be all that you need to do, or you may have to manually apply (some of) the styles defined in the template to your text.

Hi David Ceruti,

I understand how frustrating it can be when the styles in a document do not match the styles defined in the template, especially when you have already tried several troubleshooting steps. In this case, you can try the following suggestions, which may help you.

1/ Reattach the journal template

• Open the document.
• Go to the Developer tab >Document Template.
• If the Developer tab is hidden, go to File > Options > Customize Ribbon, then enable Developer.
• Check which template is currently attached to the document.
• Click Attach and select the journal’s template file. Enable
• Enable Automatically update document styles, then click OK.
  • 

2/ Reapply styles from the template

If the styles were modified within the document, you can copy the correct styles directly from the template.

• Open the document that has the formatting issue.
• Go to the Developer tab > Organizer.
• In the Organizer window, select the Styles tab.

You will see two panels:

• Left side: styles in your current document
• Right side: styles in another file (template)

If the journal template is not already loaded:

• Click Close File on one side.
• Click Open File.
• Select the journal template file.
• Once loaded, you will see styles from both the document and the template.
• Select the styles you want to fix.
• Click Copy to copy the styles from the template to the document.
• If it prompts “Replace existing style?”, click Yes.
• Close the Organizer and save the document.
  • 

3/ Check whether the document was created from another source

If the article was originally created from another document, conflicting styles may exist with the same names but different formatting, which can prevent the template styles from applying correctly.

4/ Confirm the template location

If the template file is stored locally or was downloaded:

• Ensure the template file has not been moved, renamed, or deleted.
• If Word cannot locate the template, it may not be able to apply the correct styles.

If the formatting conflicts remain, you may consider rebuilding the document using the template.

• Open Microsoft Word.
• Go to File > New.
• Open the journal template directly to create a new document based on it.
• Go to the original article document and copy all text:
• Return to the new template document and paste the text using Keep Text Only.
• Reapply the journal styles as needed:
  • Select title > apply Title style
  • Select section headings > apply Heading 1 / Heading 2
  • Body paragraphs > apply Normal / Body Text

I hope the information above is helpful. If you have any further questions, please feel free to reach out.

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In a received document, the journal’s styles may be defined differently from what the text actually looks like, or local templates (Normal.dotm) and customizations may interfere. Use these steps to align styles with the visible formatting and ensure consistency:

1. Identify what the journal’s styles are supposed to look like
   • In the document, click in a heading/paragraph that visually matches the journal’s required format.
   • On the Home tab, look in the Styles gallery to see which style name is applied (for example, “Heading 1,” “Body Text,” or a custom style name).
2. Update the style to match the visible formatting
   • Select a correctly formatted example paragraph (for example, a heading that looks right but whose style definition is wrong).
   • In the Styles gallery, right‑click the style name that should represent that formatting (for example, the journal’s “Heading 1” or “Body Text” style).
   • Choose “Update [Style Name] to Match Selection.”
   • This immediately redefines the style so that all text using that style updates to the correct formatting.
3. Fix styles that are based on the wrong parent style
   • In the Styles gallery, right‑click the problematic style and choose “Modify…”.
   • In the “Based on” dropdown, set it to “No Style” (or to the correct base style) if it is incorrectly based on a heading/body style. This keeps the formatting but removes inherited outline/heading behavior.
   • Click OK.
4. Ensure the Normal template is not overriding the journal document
   • Because Normal.dotm controls defaults for new documents, but not the style definitions inside an existing journal template, focus on modifying styles in the journal document itself rather than relying on Normal.dotm.
   • Only edit Normal.dotm if the journal requires certain defaults for any new documents created from scratch. To do that:
     • Open Word, choose File > Open.
     • Navigate to C:\Users<user name>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates.
     • Open Normal.dotm, adjust fonts/margins/spacing as needed, then save.
5. If customizations disappeared after an Office update
   • If the issue started after an update and custom styles/macros/AutoText are missing, restore the previous Normal.dotm:
     • Close Word.
     • Press Windows + R, type %appdata%\Microsoft\Templates, press Enter.
     • Look for files like Normal.dotm.old, NormalPre, NormalOld, etc.
     • Copy the most recent one, rename the copy to Normal.dotm, then reopen Word and the journal document.
6. Save a clean, journal‑ready template
   • Once styles in the journal document are correct, save a copy as a working template for future submissions so the same style set can be reused.

These steps ensure that the styles in the received document are redefined to match the journal’s required visual formatting, independent of the local Normal template.

References:

• Customize or create new styles
• Design and edit in Word
• Change the Normal template (Normal.dotm )
• Missing customizations in Office Word after an update
• How to troubleshoot problems that occur when you start or use Word