Pastely

free tool · no sign-up · runs in your browser

Paste as plain text

Paste anything into the box: a paragraph from Word, a table from a web page, a signature from an email. The fonts, colours, sizes and links stay behind, and you get clean plain text to copy. Smart quotes, non-breaking spaces and zero-width characters can go too.

paste formatted text here

plain text

paste with ⌘V. the formatting is dropped as it lands.

Free to embed. Put this paste as plain text on your blog, docs or class page.

Paste without formatting, app by app

Most apps have a paste-as-plain-text shortcut. They just don't agree on which one.

AppMacWindows
Most Mac apps (Mail, Notes, Pages, Safari)⌥⇧⌘V—
Chrome, Edge⌥⇧⌘VCtrl+Shift+V
Google Docs⇧⌘VCtrl+Shift+V
Slack, Notion⇧⌘VCtrl+Shift+V
Microsoft Word⌥⇧⌘VCtrl+V, then Ctrl, T
Outlook⌥⇧⌘VCtrl+V, then Ctrl, T

Why copied text brings its formatting along

When you copy from a web page or a document, the app puts two versions on the clipboard: plain text and rich text (HTML or RTF) with every font, size, colour and link. A normal paste takes the rich version if the app accepts it. Our clipboard viewer shows both.

The characters plain text still hides

Plain text isn't always clean. Word swaps straight quotes for curly ones, web pages use non-breaking spaces to stop words wrapping, and chat apps and AI tools leave zero-width spaces behind. They look like nothing and break spreadsheet formulas, code, passwords and search. Leave remove hidden characterson and they're gone.

Paste as Plain Text: questions

How do I paste without formatting on a Mac?+

Press Option-Shift-Command-V (⌥⇧⌘V) instead of Command-V. It's called Paste and Match Style, and it works in Pages, Mail, Notes, TextEdit, Safari, Chrome and most Mac apps. In Google Docs and Slack, Shift-Command-V (⇧⌘V) does the same.

How do I paste without formatting on Windows?+

Press Ctrl-Shift-V. It works in Chrome, Edge, Google Docs, Slack and many other apps. In Microsoft Word, paste, then press Ctrl and then T to keep text only. Windows 11 also lets you paste as plain text from the clipboard history panel (Win-V).

What does this tool remove?+

Everything except the characters: fonts, sizes, colours, bold and italics, links, images and table layout. With the options on, it also turns curly quotes into straight ones, replaces non-breaking spaces with normal spaces, removes zero-width characters and soft hyphens, and tidies extra spaces and blank lines.

What are hidden or invisible characters?+

Characters that take up no space but are still there: zero-width spaces, zero-width joiners, byte order marks and soft hyphens. They come along when you copy from web pages, PDFs and chat apps, and they break search, passwords, spreadsheet formulas and code.

Is my text sent anywhere?+

No. Everything happens in your browser. Nothing you paste leaves the page.

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