Paste anything, get Markdown
Copy formatted text from Word, Google Docs, Notion or a web page, paste it below, and get Markdown back. It happens in this tab, nothing is uploaded.
Paste into the box below, or drop a file here
or
Word, Google Docs, Notion, any web page
Converted in this tab. The file is never uploaded.
Why pasting normally loses your formatting
When you copy formatted text, your clipboard holds two versions of it: plain text and HTML. Most plain-text editors take the plain text, which throws away every heading, list and table. This page reads the HTML version instead and converts that, so the structure survives the trip.
The editor does this too
Paste rich text into the main editor and it converts automatically, with Ctrl+Z restoring the plain paste if that is what you wanted. This page is the same conversion without opening a document first.
What each source gives you
Every application writes its own flavour of clipboard HTML, and the differences show up in the result. What to expect:
| Copied from | What comes through | What to watch |
|---|---|---|
| Google Docs | Headings, lists, tables, bold, italic, links | Heading levels follow the document's styles, so text merely made big and bold arrives as a paragraph |
| Microsoft Word | Headings, lists, tables, formatting, footnotes as text | Word's clipboard carries a lot of layout markup; it is unwrapped, but tracked changes come through as their accepted state |
| Notion | Headings, lists, toggles as headings, code blocks, tables | Databases copy as tables of their current view, not the whole database |
| A web page | Whatever the page's real structure is | Sites that style divs instead of using headings give you paragraphs, because that is all the markup says |
| Slack or Discord | Bold, italic, code, links | Their own markup is already close to Markdown, so most of it round-trips |
| A PDF viewer | Plain text only | PDFs carry no structure to convert: use PDF to Markdown, which reads the layout instead |
Images are the one thing that does not travel
A pasted image usually arrives as a link back to where it was hosted (Google Docs and Notion both do this) and that link often requires being
signed in to the original document. The Markdown will contain an
 that renders as a broken image for anyone
else.
The fix is to paste the image separately into the editor, which embeds the bytes in the document itself rather than pointing at somebody's server. It makes the file bigger and it makes it self-contained, which for a document you are about to send somewhere is usually the trade you want.
When the paste comes out as one block of text
The application you copied from wrote no HTML to the clipboard, so there was only plain text to read. This happens with terminals, some code editors, most PDF viewers, and anything running inside a remote desktop. Nothing is wrong: there was simply no structure to preserve, and no converter can invent it.
If the text has an obvious shape (indented bullets, numbered lines, a title on the first line) the formatter will often turn it into real Markdown in one pass.
Nothing leaves the tab
The clipboard is read by JavaScript in this page and converted here. Whatever you paste (a contract, a medical letter, an internal document) is never sent anywhere, which is the reason this tool exists as a page rather than as a service. Switch the network off and try it.
Common questions
- How do I paste formatted text as Markdown?
- Copy from Word, Google Docs, Notion or any web page, then paste into the left pane. The formatting behind your selection is converted and the Markdown appears on the right.
- Why does this work at all?
- When you copy formatted text, the clipboard holds two versions: plain text and HTML. Most editors take the plain text and lose the structure. This reads the HTML instead, so headings, lists and tables survive.
- Does it work from Google Docs?
- Yes. Select in the document, copy, and paste here. Headings, lists, tables, links and emphasis all carry across. No Google account or authorisation is involved because nothing talks to Google.
- Is anything sent anywhere?
- No. The clipboard is read by the page, converted in the tab, and displayed. Nothing about what you paste is transmitted or stored on a server.
- Can I do this while writing instead?
- Yes, the main editor does the same conversion automatically when you paste rich text into it, and Ctrl+Z once restores the original plain paste if you wanted that.
Sources
- MDN: Clipboard APIwhy a paste can carry HTML as well as text