How-To

How to Remove the Annoying Paste Box From Microsoft Word

Updated

Have you ever wondered how to disable the annoying Copy and Paste Popup box in Microsoft Office? Here’s how to disable it.

Most of us use the basic Microsoft Office commands of Copy and Paste on a daily basis. Nothing too exciting there. But, I often get annoyed with the Paste Options pop-up which shows up each time I paste something into a Word document or Excel worksheet.

Disable Paste Box from Microsoft Word

The pop-up menu has a few useful options, but it mostly gets in the way and likes to linger around longer than necessary, slowing me down. Are you fed up with the Paste Options pop-up?  Let’s get rid of it!

Paste Options popup box in Word

We’re going to disable the Paste Options box in Word, but this procedure also applies to Excel and PowerPoint.

Go to File > Options. Then, click Advanced in the left pane on the Word Options dialog box.

In the Cut, copy, and paste section, uncheck the Show Paste Options button when content is pasted box.

Click OK.

Uncheck the Show Paste Options button when content is pasted box in Word

No More Annoying Paste Options Box

Now when you paste items into Microsoft Office documents, you will no longer be plagued by the Paste Options box. Yes, the popup can be useful, but the majority of the time it just gets in the way.

66 Comments

66 Comments

  1. groovinJackman

    May 11, 2011 at 5:08 pm

    Nice – this was a lot less cumbersome than removing the mini-toolbar:

    https://www.groovypost.com/howto/how-to/how-to-disable-the-right-click-mini-toolbar-in-word-2007-and-word-2010/

  2. Laurie

    May 12, 2011 at 8:59 am

    Thank you for this one. I find myself “plagued” all the time. I’m so glad there is someone like groovy post figuring out all this stuff for me! I look forward to the daily emails and save them for future reference.

    • MrGroove

      May 12, 2011 at 3:51 pm

      Hi Laurie! All of us here at groovyPost thank you for the great feedback! We work hard to put something out everyday so thanks for taking the time to drop a note. We read EVERY comment. Also, feel free to comment on articles you love so we know what you groovyReaders want us to write about. Were geeks so we love to write about anything Tech. Might as well be what you guys are interested in!

      -Steve

      • Ziggy

        December 5, 2016 at 10:12 pm

        Wow! I’ve never seen so many thank you’s for such a simple, nifty little tip like this in my many years of surfing the net. So, I’m going to add my thank you to this deceptively and ingenious tip…Thank you… Thank you… Thank you… And keep up those brilliant ideas which keep me tracking back to GroovyPost, time and time again!.

    • Gabrielle

      August 4, 2015 at 3:13 pm

      Thank you so much Austin. I was being driven nuts by the appearance of this Paste Option box every time I made a correction to my Dragonspeak text. Half my time was taken up removing it and then getting back to business. Your instructions were clear and I followed them easily. (I’m a blonde!)
      I’m grateful for your knowledge and your willingness to share it.

  3. Cliff

    June 1, 2011 at 3:46 pm

    Thanks, exactly what I was looking for!

  4. Erica

    October 14, 2011 at 3:44 pm

    thank god! This is SO ANNOYING! It got in my way ALL THE TIME. Thanks!

    • CC

      October 25, 2017 at 5:01 pm

      Ditto!!

  5. Yukes

    November 30, 2011 at 2:49 am

    Thank you thank you!!

  6. Happy Editor

    January 4, 2012 at 11:01 am

    Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! This was REALLY annoying!!!!

  7. Lois

    January 6, 2012 at 2:16 pm

    THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!!!

  8. FountainpenLady

    January 31, 2012 at 5:00 pm

    One person’s godsend is another person’s pox. WORD does try to be so much. So cool and for that its dedicated teams have my gratitude, especially now that the references function, e.g. citations, etc., is growing up in Office 2010. The software has a long way to go, however, before providing scholar-friendly word-processing with the tools of a Nota Bene. But nine out of 10 receiving institutions only take WORD .docs formats. So, like a fly in the room, there are constant pop-ups and flashes of margin readings, etc. Thanks for swatting at least one down.
    Here’s a tough question. How does one get the references’ master list to print out or even copy?
    Thanks very much.

  9. heidisierra

    March 26, 2012 at 9:24 am

    Thank you!!

  10. Tony Thomas

    March 27, 2012 at 11:39 am

    When i copy and paste i want the original format of the internet with the hyperlink but my word document only shows keep text only format and checked.
    (File/options/advanced/cut,copy and paste) it is all set on (Keep source formatting(Default)). and still i see only the keep text only format on the paste option.

  11. Chris

    April 3, 2012 at 9:45 am

    Thank you so much, I get really tired of Microsoft doing all this unnecessary crap that just annoys you more than being helpful. All this extra stuff and clutter should be disabled by default in my opinion.

  12. Robert

    April 3, 2012 at 2:21 pm

    I usually use Notepad++. but occasionally have to use Word. Word sure seems bloated and distracting. Thanks for helping me quiet Word down a little.

    Thank you!

  13. Cathy

    July 1, 2012 at 3:15 pm

    I did this and it STILL SHOWS UP! Grrrrrrrr.

    • CC

      October 25, 2017 at 5:02 pm

      I had to do it a couple of times. :/

  14. JoJo

    August 4, 2012 at 8:05 pm

    Thank you so much!!! Very helpful.

    • Steve Krause

      August 5, 2012 at 3:07 pm

      You bet! Glad it helped you out. Thanks for the comment.

      Sent from my Mobile

  15. Bruce

    August 13, 2012 at 10:11 am

    It stops the paste options from showing up when you alt v but when right clicking and selecting paste, the option bar still shows up. Any idea on how to remove the paste option when right clicking to paste?

  16. Janis Jocklin

    September 7, 2012 at 12:24 pm

    THANK YOU!!!

    • Steve Krause

      September 7, 2012 at 1:53 pm

      heheh you bet Janis! Welcome to groovyPost, thanks for the feedback!

  17. Ferd

    September 16, 2012 at 10:36 am

    Yes, very irritating thing, that paste bar. The thing that fascinates me the most is that this paste bar is implemented like this. That it lingers on to do more pastes i can understand, but after 2 or 3 seconds it should be clear the user wants to move on. Probably it is simply forgotten to program a time limit.

  18. Daniel

    October 1, 2012 at 1:23 am

    Thank you. This was getting to be a new Clippy….

  19. Mark

    October 18, 2012 at 2:05 am

    From Belgium thanks too, what a annoying thingie from MS, it must be in their way too when they design it? Whatever, I can go back to work again without this annoying menu in my screen. Have a nice day

  20. Wojtek Sokolowski

    February 6, 2013 at 6:59 am

    Thanks a lot. This was helpful. The “nanny corporation” approach that Micro$oft et al. take is really annoying. Why don’t they turn all their “options” off by default and let the user decide which one he or she needs?

  21. Gary

    March 14, 2013 at 10:30 am

    Thank you!

  22. amy

    April 26, 2013 at 10:17 am

    Thank you!

  23. Paul

    May 3, 2013 at 8:32 am

    Thank you!

    • Steve Krause

      December 5, 2016 at 10:28 pm

      You bet! Glad the tip helped you out!

  24. Matt

    June 28, 2013 at 4:19 am

    Thanks for the tip.

    I find the Paste Bar useful at times and don’t want it to go away permanently. When it does get in my way, I find that pressing the escape key will make it go away.

    • Kailasa

      August 2, 2013 at 10:07 pm

      Thanks Matt!
      I didn’t want to completely disable this function as this article describes…just wanted to get rid of the icon once I didn’t need it. (In older versions of Word it would disappear after the next text entry/selection/etc.
      Thank you for solving my problem!!!

  25. Michael

    July 2, 2013 at 3:16 am

    thank you for this

    been getting in the way for years and just today i bothered to look up how to do something about it.

  26. Nancy

    July 5, 2013 at 10:12 am

    Yes, thank you, thank you!!

  27. Michael

    July 17, 2013 at 8:09 pm

    i just wonder if you can help me with similar topic,”how to disable paste option in access 2010″? because there is no advanced option…..thank you.

  28. RJ

    September 4, 2013 at 2:39 pm

    Thank you so much! That icon was driving me nuts!

  29. Adrian

    October 1, 2013 at 5:48 am

    Thank you so much for this. I finally took care of this after having been annoyed by it for so long. I can’t understand why they would put that feature.
    Anyways, thank you so much!!

  30. Phil

    April 1, 2014 at 6:57 am

    Thanks so much for posting this. Helped me out considerably.

    • sharon paddock

      June 25, 2014 at 6:03 am

      Cannot thank you enough! : )

  31. Sandra de Roos

    July 25, 2014 at 1:06 am

    Thanks for making this annoying thing go away so quickly!

  32. PersembeBaligi

    October 20, 2014 at 12:13 am

    Thank you so much. I cannot describe the relieve that I’m in right now…

  33. Catherine

    November 18, 2014 at 7:48 am

    THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You can’t even imagine how delighted I am now that I found how to remove this stupid pop-up that lingers forever right where I want to edit my text.
    God bless!

  34. Connor

    April 3, 2015 at 1:18 pm

    Oh my God! Thank you! I’ve been ready to throw something at my monitor ’cause I can’t see what the heck I’m editing half the time. You’re a lifesaver!

    • Steve Krause

      December 5, 2016 at 10:29 pm

      Ha! Well I’m glad you found our tip vs. lose a monitor! Really happy you found our site! Thanks for the comment.

  35. someguy

    April 11, 2015 at 6:25 pm

    Looking for for alternate ways to remove it, see same instructions on many other sites.

    Paste Options still show up even with everything unchecked, seen other comments about this.

  36. Oranges

    June 19, 2015 at 2:24 am

    Thank you for this helpful advice!

  37. randy

    July 9, 2015 at 11:27 pm

    Thank you! That was helpful. Why can’t the Word “Help” section be that easy?

  38. Praveen

    August 12, 2015 at 8:54 pm

    Thanks alot

  39. Rosie

    February 27, 2016 at 4:48 pm

    Many thanks for this. I’m trying to fix a fiddly list and not an expert Word user. This was driving me nuts! It was covering bits of text I needed to select.

  40. SG

    March 4, 2016 at 6:19 am

    Thank you. You are my friend from now on.

  41. Magnus

    July 3, 2016 at 6:23 am

    Thank you!!!!

  42. Soraya

    December 4, 2016 at 3:32 pm

    OMG THANK YOU.. I should have googled this YEARS AGO!!!

    • Steve Krause

      December 5, 2016 at 10:31 pm

      You know what’s funny? I used this tip back with Word 2013 then forgot about it. Just fixed it again myself on 2016!

      Glad this tip helped you out! Be sure to share the link back here with your friends!

      -S
      groovyPost.com

  43. timmyjoe42

    December 5, 2016 at 1:58 pm

    Excellent. Helped me out. I’m not sure why MicroSoft feels the need to have this turned on AND to always have it pop up right where my cursor is so I can’t see where I am typing.

    • Steve Krause

      December 5, 2016 at 2:49 pm

      Agreed. It’s pretty much “always” in my way.

  44. Jason Kelly

    December 26, 2016 at 6:02 pm

    REALLY annoying!Very helpful Thank you!

  45. Jennifer

    June 7, 2017 at 5:44 pm

    Any tips on doing it for Powerpoint 2016 for Mac? I can’t find the options you show in the instructions. This paste options box is driving me crazy!!

    • Bob

      October 9, 2017 at 3:10 pm

      Please reply if you find a solution. I have the same problem. Arrrgh!

  46. Julie

    September 3, 2017 at 3:51 pm

    Oh my gosh! Thank you so much! This has been driving me crazy for months! Finally got fed up with it today and decided to fix the problem once and for all! You are awesome!!!

    • Bob

      October 9, 2017 at 3:11 pm

      Please reply if you find a solution. I have the same problem.

  47. Jeffrey Riggs

    September 11, 2017 at 10:23 am

    Thank you Thank You THANK YOU. Would the person from Microsoft that “enabled this” please comment? I often wonder on “WHY” with so many things you do. An explanation would help, so we don’t think bad of MicroSoft.

  48. Mary Brady

    March 11, 2018 at 6:49 pm

    I can’t thank you enough!!

  49. Pamela Mukhopadhyay

    May 17, 2018 at 8:44 am

    THANK YOU THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!

  50. Adam Smith

    December 22, 2018 at 5:20 am

    THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  51. Kate Bluestone

    January 11, 2019 at 7:12 am

    THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This drove me insane in excel. It covered a cell or two and wouldn’t go away! You just made my life less stressful :)

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