Control the formatting when you paste text

In Word, you can choose to paste text using the formatting of the source, destination, or just pure text. If you always want one of the options, set it as the default for pasted text.

Set default paste options

By default, Word preserves the original formatting when you paste content into a document using Ctrl+V, the Paste button, or right-click + Paste. To change the default, follow these steps.

Copy - paste options in Word

  1. Go to File >Options >Advanced.
  2. Under Cut, copy, and paste, select the down arrow for the setting to change.
  3. Pasting within the same document When you paste content into the same document from which you copied the content.
  4. Pasting between documents When you paste content that was copied from another Word document.
  5. Pasting between documents when style definitions conflict When you paste content that was copied from another Word document, and the style that is assigned to the copied text is defined differently in the document where the text is being pasted.
  6. Pasting from other programs When you paste content that was copied from another program, such as a browser.

Change options when pasting content

When you copy content from a formatted source, such as a webpage or another Word document, you can select options at the time you paste it into your document.

Paste options button

  1. Select or tap where you want to paste the content.
  2. Press CTRL+V and then select the Paste Options

Paste options menu with cursor hovering over the third The first two paste options are "Keep source formatting" and "Merge formatting."" />

button or press CTRL. Use the left and right arrow keys or hover over the paste options for more information.

Turn on the Paste Options button

The Paste Options

Paste options button

button lets you select formatting options and is on by default. If you don't see the button, it might be turned off. Follow these steps to turn it on.

  1. Go to File >Options >Advanced.
  2. In the Cut, copy, and paste section, select Show Paste Options button when content is pasted.
  3. Select OK.

If the setting is on but you don't see the button when you paste, make sure you're pasting formatted content, not pure text (like from NotePad.)

Get the look you want

When you copy text from a Word document, webpage, or other app's document and paste it into a Word document, you can choose how the text is formatted. You can keep the original formatting, merge with the destination formatting, or paste just plain text.

Paste items from a bulleted or numbered list

When you paste items from a bulleted or numbered list into another list, you can keep their original formatting or sequence, or blend in with the numbering or bullets of the destination list.

Paste numbered items so the sequence continues Choose Continue List (C) to have inserted items stay in sequence in the list.

Keep original sequence on numbered items Choose New List (N) to have inserted items keep their original list sequence.

Paste bulleted items into a numbered list To keep the bullets, choose Keep Source Formatting (K). To convert bullets to numbers, choose Merge Formatting (M).

Paste numbered items into a bulleted list To keep the original numbers, choose Don't Merge List (D). To convert the numbers to bullets, choose Merge List (M).

Paste Text Only lists By default, bullets and numbers are preserved when pasting text only. To turn this behavior off:

  1. Go to File >Options >Advanced.
  2. Clear Keep bullets and numbers when pasting text with Keep Text Only option.
  3. Select OK.
Use smart cut and paste

Smart cut and paste allows the format of pasted content to be adjust automatically by the app to match the format of the destination document.