How to Clear Formatting in a Microsoft Word Document

Clearing formatting in Microsoft Word removes all manual styling—bold, italics, font colors, highlights, spacing, and paragraph settings—from selected text, returning it to the document’s default style. This is useful when pasting content from a website, email, or another document that brings along unwanted formatting. You only need the document open in Word; no other tools are required.

What You’ll Need

A Microsoft Word document with formatted text (Word 2010 or later, including Microsoft 365).
Access to the Home tab in the ribbon (it’s the default tab when you open Word).

Step-by-Step

Open your document in Microsoft Word.
Select the text you want to clear formatting from. You can do this by clicking and dragging your mouse over the text, or by placing your cursor at the start of the text, holding Shift, and pressing the arrow keys. To select the entire document, press Ctrl+A (Windows) or Command+A (Mac).
Go to the Home tab in the ribbon at the top of the window. It is usually the first tab on the left.
Look for the “Clear All Formatting” button. It is located in the Font group, which is the second group from the left. The button looks like an eraser with a small “A” next to it. If you hover over it, the tooltip will say “Clear All Formatting.”
Click the “Clear All Formatting” button. This will instantly remove all manual formatting from the selected text, leaving only the default paragraph and character styles (usually Calibri 11 or whatever your document’s default is).
Check the result. The selected text should now appear in the document’s default style. If you want to clear formatting from another section, repeat steps 2–5.
Alternative method (keyboard shortcut): After selecting the text, press Ctrl+Spacebar (Windows) or Command+Spacebar (Mac) to clear character formatting (like bold and font color), then press Ctrl+Q (Windows) or Command+Q (Mac) to clear paragraph formatting (like line spacing and indents). This two-step approach gives you more control if you only want to reset one type of formatting.

Common Mistakes

Only clearing character formatting: Using Ctrl+Spacebar alone removes fonts, sizes, bold, and italics, but leaves paragraph settings like spacing and indents intact. If you want everything reset, use the “Clear All Formatting” button or follow with Ctrl+Q.
Clearing formatting on the wrong selection: If you accidentally select too much text, you’ll clear formatting on content you wanted to keep styled. Always double-check your selection before clicking the button.
Expecting it to remove hyperlinks: The “Clear All Formatting” button does not remove hyperlinks. To remove a link, right-click it and choose “Remove Hyperlink.”
Using “Clear Formatting” on styles: If your text uses a built-in style (like Heading 1), clearing formatting will not remove the style itself—it only removes manual overrides. The text will still appear as a heading. To reset the style, select the text and choose “Normal” from the Styles gallery.

Tips

Use “Paste Special” to avoid the problem: When pasting from another source, use Ctrl+V and then click the small clipboard icon that appears at the bottom-right of the pasted text. Choose “Keep Text Only” to paste without any formatting from the source.
Set a default font: If you find yourself clearing formatting often, change the default font and paragraph settings in the “Normal” style. Go to the Home tab, right-click “Normal” in the Styles group, choose “Modify,” set your preferences, and click “OK.” New documents will use these settings.
Clear formatting before applying new styles: If you’re reformatting a document, clear all formatting first, then apply consistent styles. This prevents conflicts between old and new formatting.
Use the Format Painter: If you want to copy formatting from one section to another (instead of clearing it), select the formatted text, double-click the Format Painter icon (paintbrush) in the Clipboard group, then click and drag over the text you want to format. Press Esc to turn it off.

Troubleshooting

The button doesn’t seem to work: If you click “Clear All Formatting” and nothing changes, the text may already be using the default style, or the formatting might come from a paragraph style rather than manual overrides. Check the Styles gallery; if the style is not “Normal,” select the text and click “Normal” in the Styles group.
Formatting returns when you type: If you clear formatting and then type new text that still appears bold or colored, the problem is likely the paragraph mark (¶) at the end of the paragraph. Select the paragraph mark (it’s an invisible character) and clear its formatting, or select the entire paragraph and clear formatting again.
Keyboard shortcuts don’t work: If Ctrl+Spacebar or Ctrl+Q don’t respond, check if you’re in a text box or a table cell where shortcuts may be overridden. Click inside the text box and try again. Also, make sure you’re not in “Overtype” mode; press Insert to toggle it off.
Formatting is locked: If the document is protected (Review tab > Restrict Editing), you may not be able to clear formatting. Check the Review tab and click “Stop Protection” if you have the password.
Text still looks formatted after clearing: Some formatting, like highlighting (the marker-style color behind text), is not removed by “Clear All Formatting.” To remove highlighting, select the text, go to the Home tab, click the arrow next to the highlighter icon (a pen with a colored bar), and choose “No Color.”

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Does “Clear All Formatting” remove bullet points and numbering?
No. It removes manual formatting like bold and font size, but list formatting (bullets, numbers) is part of the paragraph style. If your text is in a list style, you’ll need to change the style to “Normal” to remove the bullets.

2. Can I undo clearing formatting?
Yes. Immediately after clearing, press Ctrl+Z (Windows) or Command+Z (Mac) to undo the action. Word supports multiple undos, so you can go back several steps.

3. Will clearing formatting change the text content?
No. It only changes the appearance. Words, punctuation, and spelling remain exactly the same.

4. How do I clear formatting from the entire document at once?
Press Ctrl+A (Windows) or Command+A (Mac) to select everything, then click “Clear All Formatting.” This resets the whole document to the default style.

5. What’s the difference between “Clear All Formatting” and “Clear Formatting” in the Styles pane?
They are essentially the same action. The “Clear All Formatting” button is in the Font group, while the Styles pane (opened by pressing Alt+Ctrl+Shift+S) has a “Clear Formatting” option at the top of the styles list. Both remove manual formatting from the selection.

6. Does clearing formatting affect footnotes or headers?
No. The action only affects the selected text in the main body. To clear formatting in headers, footers, or footnotes, you must select that text separately.

General steps for current mainstream versions; menus can differ by device and version. See the disclaimer or report an error.

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