The Format Painter button is a handy little tool that can quickly copy formats for text and shapes, to other text or objects. It’s located on the Standard Toolbar in MS Office 2003 and earlier editions. In MS Office 2007, it’s on the left side of the ribbon, in the Clipboard area.

In Excel, click on the cell where the text is formatted the way you want it. Click on the Format Painter button. (Your cursor turns into a plus sign with a paintbrush next to it). Then click on the cell that has the text that you want to change. It should instantly change to match the formatting that was in the first cell. If you want to change the text in multiple cells, see the Quick Tip down below.

In MS Word, have you ever had a section of text suddenly look different from the rest? The cause might be that the section of text has been switched back to the default settings that are MS Word’s default settings, or it could be a computer glitch. You might also want to change text that you’ve pasted in your document from somewhere else. To fix this, select some text that has the proper formatting, by dragging your cursor over it. (Don’t worry about selecting entire words or phrases – ANY text will do). Click on the Format Painter button. (Your cursor turns into an I bar with a paintbrush next to it.) Then drag over the text that you want formatted the same way (note – if you drag over additional text that already has the correct formatting on it, that text will not change, so don’t worry about being precise).

This works in PowerPoint the same way, too.

Quick Tip: If you double-click on the Format Painter button, it will keep the selected formatting on, so you can change multiple selections of text or objects. Just click once again on it when you are finished, to turn it off.