Paste without formatting: copy from the web or AI without breaking your document
After pasting, click the Paste Options (Ctrl) button that appears next to the text and choose Keep Text Only. You can also use Home › Paste › Paste Special › Unformatted Text. To make it permanent, go to File › Options › Advanced › Cut, copy, and paste and set “Pasting from other programs” to Keep Text Only.
You copy a paragraph from a web page, from ChatGPT or from a PDF, paste it into your document… and it lands with a different font, a different size, a gray background, blue links and spacing that matches nothing else. You select it, change the font, remove the color… and something still looks “off”. Word isn't misbehaving: it's doing exactly what you asked.
When you copy something, the clipboard doesn't store just the letters: it keeps several “versions” of the same content, one with all the formatting and one as plain text. When you paste, Word picks the richest one by default. It's like ordering a coffee and getting it served with the cup, the saucer and the tablecloth from the café across the street.
In this guide you learn how to keep just the text, when it pays to keep bold and lists, and how to make pasting from other programs always “text only”. Then you apply your styles and the document looks like one piece.
What you'll learn
- Why text copied from the web, AI or a PDF arrives with someone else's formatting
- What each paste option does and when to use Keep Text Only
- Paste Special, the keyboard shortcut and a “text only” default paste
- What to do after pasting so the text picks up your styles
Step by step
Understand what travels in the clipboard
When you copy from a browser, an AI chat or a PDF reader, the clipboard stores the content in several formats at once: an HTML version (with fonts, colors, tables and links), a rich-text version and a plain-text version. By default, Word picks the most complete one. That's why the text arrives with the website's font, the gray background of the AI's code block, or a break at the end of every line from the PDF.
If the source is another Word document, its styles travel too: if Normal is Arial 10 over there, it can walk into your document and fight with your Normal.
With formatting marks turned on (Ctrl+Shift+8) you immediately see what arrived hidden: manual line breaks, tabs and double spaces.
Paste, then click the Paste Options (Ctrl) button
Paste as usual with Ctrl+V. Just below the pasted text a small button with a clipboard icon and the label (Ctrl) appears: that's the Paste Options button. Click it (or press Ctrl) and you'll see three icons: Keep Source Formatting, Merge Formatting and Keep Text Only. If you copied from another Word document with different styles, Use Destination Styles shows up as well.
Hover over each icon without clicking and Word previews the result. Choose Keep Text Only: the paragraph instantly takes the font, size and style of the place where you pasted it. From the keyboard: press Ctrl and then T (the letters in brackets next to each option are K, M and T).
The button disappears as soon as you type something or do anything else. If you missed it, press Ctrl+Z and paste again.
Pick the right one of the three options
Each option fits a different situation:
- Keep Source Formatting: the text arrives exactly as it was (font, colors, tables, links). Only when you want to reproduce the original faithfully.
- Merge Formatting: takes your document's font, size and color, but keeps bold, italics, lists and links. It's the middle ground, ideal for a well-structured AI answer.
- Keep Text Only: keeps the letters and nothing else. Bold, links and images disappear, and tables turn into loose paragraphs. It's the clean option for the web, PDFs and almost everything else.
The same options live on the ribbon, before you paste: Home › Clipboard › Paste (click the arrow under the button). That's also where you'll find Paste Special… and Set Default Paste….
Use Paste Special › Unformatted Text
There's a classic route that works in every version of Word: Home › Clipboard › Paste › Paste Special… (or Ctrl+Alt+V). In the Paste Special dialog, the As: list shows every format available in the clipboard. Choose Unformatted Text and click OK.
The advantage: you can see where the content comes from (Source) and pick a specific format, for example HTML Format to keep a table.
If the list only shows “Unformatted Text”, the source program didn't copy anything else: there's no formatting to lose.
Try the Ctrl+Shift+V shortcut (up-to-date Microsoft 365)
In up-to-date versions of Microsoft 365, Word added a direct shortcut to paste text only: Ctrl+Shift+V, the same one browsers and many other apps use.
Test it before you rely on it: copy a paragraph from a website, press the shortcut and check whether it comes in clean. In Word 2016, 2019 and 2021, and in Microsoft 365 installs that haven't been updated, Ctrl+Shift+V does something else: it pastes the formatting you previously copied with Ctrl+Shift+C, not the text.
If your Word doesn't have the shortcut, use Paste Special or change the default in the next step: the result is the same.
Make “text only” the default when pasting from other programs
Go to File › Options › Advanced and scroll down to the Cut, copy, and paste section. You'll see four lists: Pasting within the same document, Pasting between documents, Pasting between documents when style definitions conflict and Pasting from other programs.
Under Pasting from other programs choose Keep Text Only and click OK. From now on, anything you copy from a browser, an AI chat, a PDF or an email comes in clean with a plain Ctrl+V. The Paste Options button still appears in case you want to keep the formatting in a specific case.
If you receive lots of other people's Word documents, also set “Pasting between documents” to Merge Formatting: their styles won't sneak into yours.
This setting belongs to your copy of Word, not to the document: on another computer you'll have to set it again.
After pasting, apply your styles
Clean text doesn't mean well-formatted text: the headings from the website or the AI are now ordinary paragraphs. Put the cursor in each heading and apply Heading 1 or Heading 2 (Ctrl+Alt+1 and Ctrl+Alt+2), select the lists and click Home › Paragraph › Bullets or Numbering. Three or four clicks later, someone else's text looks like you wrote it and, as a bonus, you can build an automatic table of contents.
It's the ideal workflow with AI: ask ChatGPT, Gemini or Claude for the draft, paste it with Keep Text Only and apply the styles yourself (more tricks for pasting AI text). If the answer arrives with symbols such as ## or **, that's Markdown: here's how to turn it into real headings and lists.
Expert tips
- Lawyers: clauses from a PDF or a statute. When you copy a section of a law published online or a clause from an earlier contract in PDF, paste text only and then apply your clause style: the automatic numbering carries on and no foreign fonts get in. More in automatic heading and clause numbering.
- PDFs bring a break at the end of every line. Turn on formatting marks (Ctrl+Shift+8) to see them and remove them with Find and Replace (Ctrl+H): search for
^p(or^lif they're manual line breaks) and replace it with a space. Guide: advanced Find and Replace. - Already pasted it with formatting? Select the text and use Home › Font › Clear All Formatting: it strips fonts, colors and sizes and leaves the paragraph in Normal. Guide: Format Painter and Clear Formatting.
- Keep bullets when pasting text only. In File › Options › Advanced › Cut, copy, and paste, check Keep bullets and numbers when pasting text with Keep Text Only option. Word turns the bullets into text characters, not real lists, but you don't lose them.
Common mistakes and how to fix them
The Paste Options (Ctrl) button doesn't appear when you paste.
It's turned off in File › Options › Advanced › Cut, copy, and paste: check “Show Paste Options button when content is pasted”. In the meantime, use Home › Paste › Paste Special › Unformatted Text.
You press Ctrl+Shift+V and nothing is pasted, or odd formatting appears.
Your version of Word doesn't have the text-only shortcut: in Word 2016, 2019 and 2021 that combination pastes the formatting previously copied with Ctrl+Shift+C. Use Paste Special (Ctrl+Alt+V) or change the default paste in File › Options › Advanced.
You paste from another Word document and your Normal style changes font, or new styles show up in the gallery.
On the Paste Options button choose Use Destination Styles or Keep Text Only. To prevent it for good, in File › Options › Advanced set “Pasting between documents” to Merge Formatting or Keep Text Only.
In Word for Mac the Paste Options button appears after pasting just the same, with the same options. Paste Special is in the Edit menu › Paste Special… (Control+⌘+V) and, in recent versions of Microsoft 365 for Mac, ⌘+⇧+V pastes text only. The default paste settings are under Word › Preferences › Edit.
Frequently asked questions
Does Keep Text Only remove hyperlinks, pictures and tables?
Yes. Links become ordinary text (the address is lost), pictures disappear and tables turn into loose paragraphs. If you need to keep a table or a link, use Merge Formatting, which adapts the font and size to your document but keeps bold, lists, tables and links.
Why does text from ChatGPT or Claude arrive with ## and ** instead of headings and bold?
Some AI apps copy the answer as Markdown, a system of text marks. Paste it as text only and turn it into real headings and lists with the guide turn AI Markdown into Word headings and lists.
Does the change in File › Options affect all my documents?
Yes. It's a preference of your Word installation, not of the document: it applies to everything you paste on that computer. It doesn't travel with the file and doesn't affect other people.
Official sources
Microsoft documentation consulted for this guide.
Saved only in this browser.