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.

After running PureText.exe, you will see a "PT" icon appear near the clock on your task bar. You can click on this icon to remove formatting from the text that is currently on the clipboard. You can right-click on the icon to display a menu with more options.

The easiest way to use PureText is to simply use its hot-key to paste text instead of using the standard CTRL+V hot-key that is built into most Windows applications. To configure PureText, right-click on its tray icon and choose "Options" from the pop-up menu. The default hot-key is WINDOWS+V, but this can be changed. In this Options window, you can also configure PureText to run each time you log into Windows.

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.

What's New:

  • Added support for Windows Store. If you are on Windows 10 (version 1607 or newer), you can now install, uninstall, and automatically get updates for PureText from the Store.

  • Added some warning dialogs if PureText is already running. This can help resolve some confusion if you have multiple versions of PureText on your computer.

  • Localization file can reside in the app directory, the user's local app data directory, or the system's app data directory. This is needed to support Window Store installs that don't allow access to the app directory.