The simplest way: turn off Track Changes before you print
Word stores comments in a separate layer from your document text. When you print, Word includes that layer by default — so your reader sees both the document and every comment you left. To print without comments showing, you need to hide that layer before printing.
The fastest method is to turn off the display of comments entirely. Open your document, go to the Review tab at the top, find the Comments group, and click the dropdown arrow next to Show Comments. Select No Markup. This hides all comments from view on your screen and from the printed page. When you print now, comments will not appear.
This method works the same way in Word 2016, Word 2019, Word for Microsoft 365, and Word Online. The comments remain in your document — they are just hidden — so you can turn them back on later if you need to review them.
Key Takeaways
- Click the Review tab, then set Show Comments to No Markup to hide all comments before printing.
- Hiding comments does not delete them; they stay in your document and you can turn them back on anytime.
- If you want to remove comments permanently before sharing the document, use Review > Delete > Delete All Comments in Document.
- Word's print preview shows you exactly what will print, so check it after hiding comments to confirm nothing unexpected appears on the page.
Checking the print preview so you see what actually prints
After you hide comments, always check the print preview before you send the job to the printer. Open File, then click Print. The right side of the screen shows a preview of the first page. Scroll through the preview to make sure no comments appear in the margins or between lines.
If comments still show in the preview after you selected No Markup, it usually means the comments are embedded in the document text itself rather than stored as tracked changes. This happens when someone copied and pasted comments directly into the body of the document. In that case, you will need to manually delete those lines before printing.
Permanently removing comments before you share the document
If you are sending the document to someone else and you want to make sure comments cannot be recovered, delete them entirely rather than just hiding them. Go to the Review tab, click the dropdown arrow next to Delete, and select Delete All Comments in Document. Word will remove every comment from the file.
This action cannot be undone, so save a copy of your document with comments still in it if you might need them later. Once you delete comments, they are gone from that file permanently.
Why comments show up in the first place
Word treats comments as metadata — information about the document rather than part of the document itself. When Track Changes is turned on and someone adds a comment, Word stores it separately so the original text stays clean. The problem is that Word's default print setting is to show all markup, including comments, so most people do not realize comments are printing until they see the output.
This is different from other changes tracked in Word. Deletions and insertions can be hidden the same way (through No Markup), but comments are often the surprise because they feel like they should be private notes, not part of the printed document.
Printing only certain pages when comments are in the way
If you only need to print a few pages and comments are cluttering the rest of the document, you can print a page range instead of the whole document. In the Print dialog, find the Pages field under Settings and type the page numbers you want — for example, 1-3 or 5,7,9. Word will print only those pages.
This does not remove comments from those pages, but it saves paper and time if you only need a portion of the document printed cleanly. Combine this with hiding comments first for the best result.
What happens if you save a document with comments hidden
Hiding comments does not change the saved file. When you close the document and open it again, the comments will still be there — Word remembers that you hid them, but the comments themselves are not deleted. If someone else opens your document on their computer, they will see the comments again unless you delete them permanently.
If you want to send someone a clean copy with no comments visible and no way to unhide them, you must delete the comments before saving and sending the file. Hiding them is only a temporary solution for your own printing needs.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do comments print if I just hide them without deleting?
No. When you set Show Comments to No Markup, comments do not appear on the printed page. They remain in the document file, but they will not print until you turn them back on.
Can I delete just one comment instead of all of them?
Yes. Right-click the comment in the margin or in the Comments pane and select Delete Comment. You can delete comments one at a time this way, or use Delete All Comments in Document to remove them all at once.
What if the comments are in the document text, not in the margin?
If someone typed comments directly into the body of the document instead of using Word's comment feature, hiding comments will not remove them. You will need to find and delete those lines manually before printing.
Will the person who made the comments know I deleted them?
No. Once you delete comments from a document, there is no record that they existed. The original author will not be notified, and they cannot see that the comments are gone unless they compare the file to an earlier version they saved.
Can I print comments on a separate page?
Word does not have a built-in option to print comments separately. Your best option is to take a screenshot of the Comments pane or copy comments into a separate document if you need a record of them on paper.