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Is there a keyboard shortcut in OneNote 2010 to paste text copied from a web page without the formatting? I know I can do CTRL-V, CTRL, T, but that's four key presses! Any shorter way?

3 Answers 3

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How can I paste unformatted text only

This can be done using a tiny (33KB) free (and portable) application called PureText.

You use a different keystroke instead of the normal ctrl+v to paste. Then it will convert the clipboard contents and paste "plain" text. I have mine bound to ctrl+q.

Have you ever copied some text from a web page or a document and then wanted to paste it as simple text into another application without getting all the formatting from the original source? PureText makes this simple by adding a new Windows hot-key (default is WINDOWS+V) that allows you to paste text to any application without formatting.

What PureText Will and Will Not Do

PureText only removes rich formatting from text. This includes the font face, font style (bold, italics, etc.), font color, paragraph styles (left/right/center aligned), margins, character spacing, bullets, subscript, superscript, tables, charts, pictures, embedded objects, etc. However, it does not modify the actual text. It will not remove or fix new-lines, carriage returns, tabs, or other white-space. It will not fix word-wrap or clean up your paragraphs. If you copy the source code of a web page to the clipboard, it is not going to remove all the HTML tags. If you copy text from an actual web page (not the source of the page), it will remove the formatting.

PureText is basically equivalent to opening Notepad, doing a PASTE, followed by a SELECT-ALL, and then a COPY. The benefit of PureText is performing all these actions with a single Hot-Key and having the result pasted into the current window automatically.

Source PureText


Disclaimer

I am not at all affiliated with PureText in any way but I've been using it for many years - it does exactly what it promises. PureText is completely free to use and portable.

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    Thanks, I'm surprised this functionality has not been included in either Windows or Office suite. It is there as I mentioned in my question but not in an easy shorthand way. I will give this little app a trial. Dec 16, 2014 at 12:01
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To past unformated text

Contenxt Menu Key+T

or

alt+h, v, t

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    +1, IMO the best answer as it does not require installing a new utility or restricting one's ability to paste formatted text should they choose to. Please note that for those of you who do not have a Context Menu key, you can press Shift + F10 instead. The whole key sequence is this case is Shift + F10, t. Sep 12, 2019 at 8:03
  • did not work on Win 10
    – sairfan
    Dec 27, 2020 at 16:47
  • This works in OneNote part of Microsoft 365 on Windows 10
    – OrigamiEye
    Feb 19, 2021 at 7:27
  • alt+h, v, t worked on ONeNote Win 10 for me. Not sure how to see if it's win10 OneNote or Office OneNote if there is any difference. I don't see an About section anywhere.
    – Triamus
    Jan 19, 2022 at 9:20
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This answer is for version 16 of OneNote. I am posting it here as its one of the top search results for the issue of pasting unformatted text in OneNote.

Go to settings then options. Currently at the bottom of the options you can set the default paste options to keep text only.

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