Plain Text Preference

Users strongly advocate for simple, copy-pasteable plain text over fancy fonts, stylized visuals, or formatted presentations, citing better readability and usability while some defend styling.

➑️ Stable 0.6x Web Development
4,347
Comments
20
Years Active
5
Top Authors
#6143
Topic ID

Activity Over Time

2007
18
2008
43
2009
65
2010
131
2011
137
2012
176
2013
215
2014
194
2015
164
2016
159
2017
206
2018
200
2019
225
2020
307
2021
347
2022
432
2023
426
2024
368
2025
500
2026
34

Keywords

WYSIWYG bible.com wikipedia.org KIDDING text plain text plain read text formatting just text ou ea highlight copy paste

Sample Comments

paperwork β€’ Oct 23, 2015 β€’ View on HN

Good idea. I'll justify the text. What's wrong with the font?

mikeash β€’ Apr 1, 2014 β€’ View on HN

Why don't you just copy/paste the text into a text editor of your choice and read it there?

scrrr β€’ Sep 8, 2015 β€’ View on HN

Is there a text-version of this?

GrayRoark β€’ Nov 30, 2010 β€’ View on HN

You could just send part of the text or you could just want a text with a cleaner look.

mahouse β€’ Aug 13, 2015 β€’ View on HN

Don't forget about Textual!

agentdrtran β€’ Jan 10, 2021 β€’ View on HN

some people want more than plain text

kelnos β€’ Nov 11, 2025 β€’ View on HN

I do not care about any of those criteria you mention. I want something I can copy and paste myself. Send me text. Just the text.

nicbou β€’ Oct 29, 2021 β€’ View on HN

Whatever happened to just text on a page

jxy β€’ Mar 24, 2022 β€’ View on HN

𝐈 𝐜an'𝐭 𝐫ea𝐝 𝐭h𝐞 𝐩anten𝐭. 𝐖ha𝐭 𝐚bou𝐭 𝐬om𝐞 𝐯arian𝐭? 𝐃oe𝐬 𝐭hi𝐬 𝐭ex𝐭 𝐫ea𝐝 𝐛ette𝐫 𝐨𝐫 𝐰ors𝐞?𝐖𝐑a𝐭 a𝐛ou𝐭 𝐭𝐑i𝐬 𝐭e𝐱𝐭? 𝐖ouπ₯𝐝 a𝐧y𝐭𝐑i𝐧𝐠 𝐰o𝐫𝐀 𝐛e𝐭𝐭e𝐫 𝐭𝐑a𝐧 𝐬i𝐦𝐩π₯e 𝐩π₯ai𝐧 𝐭e𝐱𝐭?

arisAlexis β€’ Jan 20, 2024 β€’ View on HN

Wouldn't this be applicable to text too?