Logical hierarchy is essential to creating properly structured heading styles. Logical Hierarchy means we that have an organized system for assigning headings, based on the numerical value indicated in the heading name.

The main principle of the concept is to start at Heading 1 (which should be the title of the document) and to not skip any levels as you go through the document.

Following is a sample document with heading styles applied, mostly in the correct order. However, there are also some skipped headings and blank headings where a style was applied to an empty line. Navigation pane from MS Word Online

Verifying Style

To see the style applied to any text in your document, you can use your arrow keys to navigate through the page and review each heading style within the "Styles" pane of the Home Tab.

"Normal" is the default style for all content until you specify otherwise.

A quick way to evaluate the heading structure of an entire document is to use the Navigation Pane from the View Tab (CTRL + F).

Select the "Headings" Option from the Navigation Pane to see your heading structure presented as an outline.

When you find a heading level has been skipped (or applied to a blank line) make the correction to your text using your Styles palette (and the DELETE key when appropriate).

Use the following sample document to use the Navigation Pane and find any skipped heading levels or blank headings.

Tip

Microsoft Word does have a style called "Title," but make sure you use "Heading 1" style for the document title. Some screen readers may not register the "Title" style as the first heading.

Table of Contents

One final benefit of using headings in your document is that you can also use your headings to create a Table of Contents for your document quickly.

In a long document, adding a Table of Contents will increase the accessibility and usability of your document.

Table of Contents & MS Word Online

Unfortunately, it is not yet possible to create a Table of Contents with MS Word Online, so you will need to create your Table of Contents on a locally-installed version of MS Word. For more information, see Microsoft's Create a table of contents.