How to Add a New Tab for Custom Templates

To add a tab to the New dialog box, you must add a new subfolder in the location in which Word saves your custom templates. After you create the new subfolder, you must add either a new Word template or a new document to the subfolder before the subfolder will appear in the New dialog box. To do this, follow these steps.

Step 1: Determine Where Your Custom User Templates Are Stored

To determine where your user templates are located, follow these steps:

1. Start Word.
2. On the Tools menu, click Options.
3. Click the File Locations tab.
4. Click User templates, and then click Modify.
   The location of your custom templates is displayed in the Folder name box.
5. Click Cancel, and then click Close.

Step 2: Create a New Subfolder for Your Custom Templates

To create a new subfolder, follow these steps:

1. On the File menu, click Save As.
2. In the Save in list, locate and then select the folder that contains the user templates (as determined in step 1).
3. On the Save As toolbar, click the Create New Folder tool.
4. In the New Folder dialog box, type the name for your new tab in the Name box, and then click OK.
5. Click Cancel to close the Save As dialog box.

NOTE: Your new tab does not appear in the New dialog box until you save a Word document or template to the new folder. To do this, proceed to step 3.

Step 3: Add Your Custom Template to Your New Subfolder

To place your custom template on your new custom tab (and to display the tab in the New dialog box), follow these steps:

1. Create or open your custom template.
2. On the File menu, click Save As.
3. In the Save in list, locate and then select the new subfolder that you created in step 2.
   
   NOTE: When you save a template (the Save as type list is set to Document Template (*.dot)), Word automatically changes the target of the Save in list to the Templates folder. To determine where Word automatically saves your custom Word templates, refer to step 1 in this article.
   
4. In the File name box, type a new name for your custom template, and then click Save.
5. On the File menu, click Close to close the template.

Step 4: Use Your New Template and Tab

To find and use your new custom template, follow these steps:

1. On the File menu, click New.
2. In the New dialog box, click your new custom tab.
3. On your new custom tab, click your custom template, and then click OK.