Part 1 of “Should I use a hyphen, an en dash, or an em dash?” covered the differences between hyphens, en dashes, and em dashes, and how to use hyphens. Part 2 covers how to use en dashes and em dashes and how to create them in Microsoft Word.

en dashes

An en dash may replace the words to or through in some cases, such as dates or numbers.

     The 2018–2019 academic year starts in late August.

     Read chapters 1–3 for our next class.

Also use en dashes in sports scores or voting results.

     The Tampa Bay Rays best the Boston Red Sox 6–5.

     The city council defeated the proposal. The vote was 4–3.

Don’t use an en dash if the sentence contains words such as from or between. Use a word instead.

     Jimmy Carter served as president from January 1977 to January 1981.

     I walk between 10,000 and 12,000 steps a day.

em dashes

Writers and editors could work for the rest of their careers and never need em dashes. They are useful, however, because they strengthen writing by emphasizing information or altering the break between thoughts. So add em dashes to stories for variety.

Em dashes may replace commas, parentheses, colons, semicolons, or even periods. Look at the following sentences, first without em dashes and then with them.

      DUI crashes, which kill more than 10,000 people a year, are preventable.

The sentence is fine as written. We used commas to set apart the non-essential phrase. But em dashes emphasize the phrase.

     DUI crashes—which kill more than 10,000 people a year—are preventable.

In these sentences em dashes replace a colon and a period:

     There are three ways editing can be done: well, quickly, or inexpensively. And you can have any two of the three.

     There are three ways editing can be done—well, quickly, or inexpensively—and you can have any two of the three.

An em dash replaces a semicolon in these sentences.

     I like editing; improving stories gives me a sense of satisfaction and fulfillment.

     I like editing—improving stories gives me a sense of satisfaction and fulfillment.

Note that in neither case is the word improving capitalized.

One more example:

     I don’t like complaints from my clients (not that I ever get any).

     I don’t like complaints from my clients—not that I ever get any.

Em dashes can be used in pairs, as in the first two examples above, or singularly, as in the last two examples.

In fiction, use em dashes to interrupt dialogue, and to resume the dialogue. The em dash goes inside the quotation marks.

     “Before the meeting starts, I want to—”

     “You’re already saying something,” said Sally Smartmouth. “That means the meeting has started.”

     “—congratulate Sally on being named Employee of the Month.”

Similarly, use an em dash if the dialogue is interrupted by narration instead of different dialogue:

     “Before the meeting starts, I want to—”

     Sally burst in, slamming the door behind her.

Creating en or em dashes

Creating en or em dashes can be problematic. On my computer, Microsoft Word creates an en dash when I type consecutive hyphens with a space before and after the hyphens, like this

I typed

     test -- test

and Word changed it to

     test – test

Word creates an em dash when I type consecutive hyphens without spaces, like this:

I typed

     test--test

and Word changed it to

     test—test

Furthermore, if I type a space before, but not after, the hyphens I get an en dash.

But if I type a space after, but not before, the hyphens I get an em dash.

Note that your results may vary, depending on your version of Word and your settings. Here’s an easier and more reliable method of creating en and em dashes if you have a full keyboard, that is, a number pad on your keyboard.

To create an en dash in Word, hold down the Ctrl key and type the minus sign on the numeric keypad (not the number keys above the letters). To create an em dash, hold down both the Alt and Ctrl keys and type the minus sign.

Note that whether you’re inserting hyphens, en dashes, or em dashes, there’s no space between the punctuation and the adjoining words.