How to Add the Path Name to a Word Document File

By Ugur Akinci

Sometimes you don’t need to know where a document is on your hard drive because it’s obvious; you have a big folder for that project and all files are neatly saved in that hard-to-miss folder.

But other times you might have a miscellaneous document, perhaps a single sheet, that needs to be updated from time to time. Such self-standing documents that are not part of a project are much harder to find when you’ve got thousands of similar files on your hard drive.

You can avoid that problem by including the PATHNAME of the file in the footer of the Word document. That way you can directly go to that address and find the file. (Another solution is of course to conduct a search but still, the pathname in the footer looks professional indeed besides being useful.)

Here is how to do it:

1) Select the Insert tab on the ribbon. Insert a Footer into your document or go to the existing footer to edit it. (Same steps apply to the header as well.)

2) Click Quick Parts > Field to display the Field dialog box:

(Click to enlarge the image)

3) Select the FileName field and the Add Path to Filename check-box.