Subscript text, meanwhile, appears slightly below the regular text line: Formatting text as superscript makes it appear slightly above the regular text line. Superscript and subscript both affect the placement of text compared to other text in a document. Superscript and Subscript in Microsoft Word But what do these formatting options do? And how do you select them? In this post, we explain the basics. Microsoft Word has options to apply superscript, subscript, and strikethrough to text in a document. Superscript, Subscript and Strikethrough in Microsoft Word