If you want to paste text without formatting it, there are a few ways to do it. Here are three methods:
- Paste the text into a text editor such as Notepad or WordPad.
- Use a search engine to find a copy of the text you want to paste and then use that search engine to find an online formatter that will format the text for you.
- Use a third method, which is described below, if you want to paste the text into an email or other document without having to worry about formatting it first.
- Paste the text into Notepad or WordPad and then press Ctrl+V (for “copy”) to paste the text into a new document. The new document will have all of the same properties as the original Notepad or WordPad document, including its title bar and window borders. However, since this is a copy of the original document, not every property will be preserved (e.g., line breaks will not be preserved). To restore some properties, such as line breaks, use Ctrl+C (for “copy” again) and then select them in the resulting list of properties in the new document’s window borders property panel.
- Use Google Chrome’s “Edit” menu item and select “Paste Text As” from the resulting list of options. This option will allow you to choose whether you want to format the text using HTML tags or not (you can also choose whether you want spaces between words or not). If you choose HTML tags formatting, Google Chrome will create tags for each word in your copied text and these tags will be used by any web browser that supports HTML tags (including Internet Explorer 8 and later). If you don’t choose HTML tags formatting, Google Chrome won’t create anytags for your copied text and all browsers that support HTMLtags will ignore them when displaying your copiedtext on web pages. To remove anyTags from your copiedtext before copying
No formatting means no line breaks, no different font sizes, no bolding and italics, and no hyperlinks. You won’t have to spend time removing formatting elements from your document. You’ll get just the text you copied as if you had typed it directly into the application you’re pasting it in.
To paste without formatting, press Ctrl+Shift+V instead of Ctrl+V. This works in a wide variety of applications, including web browsers like Google Chrome. It should work on Windows, Chrome OS, and Linux.
On a Mac, press Command+Option+Shift+V to “paste and match formatting” instead. This works in most Mac apps, too.
This keyboard shortcut unfortunately doesn’t work in Microsoft Word. To paste without formatting in Word, you can use the special Paste option on the ribbon to “Keep Text Only.” You can also set Word’s default paste options to “Keep Text Only.”
RELATED: How to Change the Default Paste Setting in Microsoft Word
If this keyboard shortcut doesn’t work in your application of choice, there’s always the low-tech method: Open a plain-text editor like Notepad, paste your text into it, and then select and copy the text. You’ll get the plain text copied to your clipboard and you can paste it into any application.
For a faster way to do this, we’ve previously shown how to use AutoHotkey to automatically remove all formatting from the text you copy to your clipboard, too.
RELATED: How to Paste Text Without the Extra Formatting
