10+ keyboard shortcuts for entering special characters in a Word document

In 10 Word annoyances (and how to turn them off), we looked at how to shut down a number of Word’s automatic changes.
Turning off certain options relieves you of some of the unexpected and often unwelcome replacements and insertions that Word is likely to impose on you. But even though you may not want Word to, say, always convert a pair of hyphens into an em dash, you might sometimes want to insert an em dash yourself.
Here are 15 useful shortcuts that let you quickly insert special characters in a document--on your terms.


Character
Shortcut
A line break
Shift+Enter
A page break
Ctrl+Enter
A column break
Ctrl+Shift+Enter
An optional hyphen
Ctrl+- (hyphen)
A nonbreaking hyphen
Ctrl+Shift+- (hyphen)
A nonbreaking space
Ctrl+Shift+Spacebar
A copyright symbol
Alt+Ctrl+C
A registered trademark symbol
Alt+Ctrl+R
A trademark symbol
Alt+Ctrl+T
An ellipsis
Alt+Ctrl+. (period)
An em dash
Ctrl+Shift+\
An en dash
Ctrl+- (on numeric keypad)
The page number
Alt+Shift+P
The current date
Alt+Shift+D
The current time
Alt+Shift+T