How to copy and paste unformatted text on Mac?

How to copy and paste unformatted text on Mac? The answer is simple. When you copy on Mac using the key combination Command + C or using the right mouse menu, you not only copy the selected text, but also the formatting it has.

When you copy text from one cell to another within the same document or into a new document, whatever formatting has been applied to that block is copied (font, colors, text size, etc., etc.). You’ll frequently have to adjust various settings in order for the rest of your work to match.

Keyboard shortcut to paste unformatted text in macOS

All you have to do on a Mac to paste unformatted text and then save yourself the trouble of changing the formatting to match the rest of your document is use a keyboard combination.

Specifically, you must use the key combination Command + Shift + Alt + V. In other words, the usual paste command but with the addition of the Shift and Alt (Option) keys.

In order to copy, you may continue using Command + C; the only difference is that you’d use Paste instead of Cut. And as you can see, remembering a shortcut isn’t difficult at all, because it’s nothing more than adding a few more keystrokes to one that you undoubtedly use many times throughout the day.

Other options for pasting plain text

We believe that pasting with Command + Shift + Alt + V is the quickest method, however if you’re not sure, there are alternative procedures that may work as well. Of course, most of them need more operations, so they are really slower in reality, although you will also discover an alternative that is even quicker than the keyboard shortcut.

Paste it into a plain text document and copy it again

Perhaps this is the most popular choice, since it is very quick and does not require access to any special software. The conventional method is to use TextEdit, a basic text editor that comes standard on all Macs.

Once you have opened a blank document with this application, you only have to paste a copied text with Command + V and then use the keyboard shortcut Command + Shift + T. This will convert the document to plain text.

The last step is to copy the text once again and paste it into the final document where required. It’s a little more time-consuming than using the shortcut, but it’s still quite effective.

Using the browser address bar

This technique might save you time if the copied text is only one sentence and there are no line breaks. You won’t have to open a TextEdit window and change to plain text because any web browser’s address bar is a simple text box.

As you can imagine the process is as simple as copying the text, pasting it in the address bar of the browser you use, and once pasted copy it again.

Once you’ve completed this, the text will be copied to the Mac clipboard, unformatted, and you’ll only need to drop it into your final document using the shortcut Command + V from the application’s top menu or by right-clicking or tapping with another mouse.