Word find all highlighted text

Someone sends you a long Word document and asks you to check only the changes, which they’ve highlighted. You have limited time so you need to find those highlighted passages quickly.

Here are two ways you can quickly find highlighted text — use the one that best suits your way of working

Zoom in/out

Zoom out the view of the document and look for pages that contain highlighting, then click on a page and zoom back in again to view and edit the highlighted text.

You can go down to about 10 or 20% to see as many pages as possible without losing the ability to see the pages containing highlights.

To zoom in/out:

• Word 2003: Select View > Zoom from the menu, then select or enter the percentage zoom you want.
• Word 2007 and later: Use the zoom slider at the bottom right of the Word window.

Here’s a few pages at 20% zoom — you can see the highlighted section easily:

Find

The other way to find highlighted text is to use the Find function. Find is particularly handy if there’s a lot of highlighting, and you think you might miss some using the zoom function. It’s also handy for finding highlights you can’t see, such as those hiding behind empty paragraph marks or graphics. Both Word 2003 and 2007 work the same way, as do later versions of Word for Windows, such as 365:

1. Press Ctrl+h to open the Find and Replace window.
2. Click More.
   
3. Click Format.
4. Select Highlight.
   
5. Highlight should be the only ‘find’ option. Click Find Next to find the next highlighted passage.
   

In this article, we would like to show you 2 handy methods to extract highlighted texts from your Word document.

Every so often, we are likely to highlight texts with colors when navigating through document. All these pieces of texts may scatter around the whole article but they definitely deserve our attention. Therefore, we can just export and arrange them in another document for quick review next time, saving us from scrolling mouse wheel over and over again.

Method 1: Utilize the “Advanced Find” Feature

1. First off, click “Home” tab then click the upside-down button behind “Find”.
2. Next choose “Advanced Find” to open the “Find and Replace” dialog box.
3. In the box, put cursor inside the “Find what” text box and then click “More”.
4. Then click “Format” button and choose “Highlight”.
5. Next click “Find In” tab and choose “Main Document”.

Now you will see all highlight texts are in selection now, just as below:

You can copy and paste them to a new document then.

Method 2: Use Word VBA

As shown in our sample, it’s not unusual to have multiple texts in different highlighting colors. Now let’s talk about the way to get all contents in the same highlighting color first.

1. First and foremost, press “Alt+ F11” to open VBA editor.
2. Then click “Normal”.
3. And click “Insert”.
4. Next choose “Module”.
5. Double click on the new module to bring out the coding space.
6. Now paste the following codes there:

Sub ExtractHighlightedTextsInSameColor()
  Dim objDoc As Document, objDocAdd As Document
  Dim objRange As Range

  Set objDoc = ActiveDocument
  Set objDocAdd = Documents.Add
  objDoc.Activate

  With Selection
    .HomeKey Unit:=wdStory
     With Selection.Find
       .Highlight = True
       Do While .Execute
         If Selection.Range.HighlightColorIndex = wdYellow Then
           Set objRange = Selection.Range
           objDocAdd.Range.InsertAfter objRange & vbCr 
           Selection.Collapse wdCollapseEnd
         End If
       Loop
     End With
  End With
End Sub

1. Then click “Run” button.

You will have a new document with all highlighted texts in it.

Then there is another macro which shall enable you to collect all highlighted texts of the same color from multi-document. What you need to do is to organize them all in one folder and take the above steps, but replace the macro with this one:

Sub ExtractHighlightedTextsInSameColorFromMultiDoc()
  Dim objDoc As Document, objDocAdd As Document
  Dim strFile As String, strFolder As String
  Dim objRange As Range
 
  '  Initialization
  strFolder = "C:UsersPublicDocumentsNew folder"
  strFile = Dir(strFolder & "*.docx", vbNormal)
 
  Set objDocAdd = Documents.Add
 
  '  Precess each file in the file folder.
  While strFile <> ""
  Set objDoc = Documents.Open(FileName:=strFolder & strFile)
 
  With Selection
    .HomeKey Unit:=wdStory
    With Selection.Find
      .Highlight = True
      Do While .Execute
        If Selection.Range.HighlightColorIndex = wdYellow Then
          Set objRange = Selection.Range
          objDocAdd.Range.InsertAfter objRange & vbCr
          Selection.Collapse wdCollapseEnd
        End If
      Loop
    End With
  End With
 
  objDoc.Close
  strFile = Dir()
  Wend
End Sub

Notes:

1. First as you can see, the 2 macros extract all texts in yellow. You can certainly replace the code “wdYellow” with other colors. Here is the link you can visit: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/office/developer/office-2003/aa172829(v=office.11)
2. Secondly, if you want to collect all highlighted texts in different colors, you just need to delete the “If Selection.Range.HighlightColorIndex = wdYellow Then” and “End If” lines.
3. Thirdly, in code line “strFolder = “C:UsersPublicDocumentsNew folder” in second macro, replace the path string path with that of the folder you have. And don’t forget to add “” at the end.

Backup is never too late

In a word, we have put so much emphasis on backup that most of you should know how important it is now. As such, we can still fail to back up on a regular basis. And the truth is, without backup, the only option left once doc corruption happens is to get a data retrieving tool.

Author Introduction:

Vera Chen is a data recovery expert in DataNumen, Inc., which is the world leader in data recovery technologies, including xlsx repair and pdf repair software products. For more information visit www.datanumen.com

When you want certain text in your document to stand out, you can use a handy built-in tool. Here’s how to highlight text in Word.

Ever used a highlighter pen to make certain sections of text pop out to you on a page? Great for making notes, but there’s a problem—highlighting a piece of paper is final. You can’t erase the color from your paper when you’re done.

In Microsoft Word, things are a bit different. You can replicate the highlighter effect in Word, but you can find and remove your highlights, unlike real highlighter pens.

This lets you go through and review your highlighted points using Word’s Find feature, but you can also remove any text highlights afterward. It’s easy to learn how to apply, remove, and find highlighted text in Word— here’s what you’ll need to do.

How to Highlight a Selection of Text in Word

If you plan only to highlight one portion of text using a single color, you can do this in just seconds in Word.

To highlight a section of text in Word:

1. Select your text. You can do this by simply dragging through it with your cursor.
2. Go to the Home tab.
3. Click the arrow next to the Text Highlight Color button.
4. Choose the color you want to use from the drop-down menu.

Once you choose a color from the drop-down menu, your selected text will update immediately to show a highlighted background in that color.

How to Highlight Multiple Selections of Text

If you have several portions of text you want to highlight, you can still use the highlighter tool to make your text stand out.

You don’t have to use the method above to do this, however, as there’s an easier way to select multiple sections of text. Once you enable the highlighter, it will remain turned on until you turn it off, allowing you to highlight additional areas.

To highlight multiple sections of text in Word:

1. Press Home on the ribbon bar.
2. Select the arrow next to the Text Highlight Color button and select a color from the drop-down menu.
3. Your cursor will change to show a blinking text cursor with a marker attached. Select the text you want to highlight by dragging through it with your mouse.

   

4. Repeat this step with any other sections of text you want to highlight.
5. When you’re done, press the arrow next to the Text Highlight Color button.
6. Select Stop Highlighting.

If you want to change colors, you can do this when the highlighter tool is active. Click the Text Highlight Color button, choose another color, and then continue to drag through your text portions to highlight them.

How to Remove a Highlight From Text

You can do this using the Text Highlight Color tool when you want to remove highlights from your text in Word. This allows you to remove highlights from specific text or your entire document.

To remove highlights from selected text in Word:

1. Select the specific text you want to unhighlight or select all of the text in your document using Ctrl + A.
2. Press Home on the ribbon bar.
3. Press the arrow next to the Text Highlight Color button.
4. Select No Color.

You don’t need to manually scroll through your document to find portions of text that you’ve highlighted. Thanks to the Find feature in Word, you can locate any highlighted text in no time.

Find Specific Highlighted Text

Maybe the highlighted text you’re looking for contains a particular word. If so, use these steps to find it:

1. Go to the Home tab.
2. Click the arrow next to Find, then select Advanced Find.
3. When the Find and Replace window opens, enter your search term in the Find What box at the top.
4. Click More on the bottom left.
5. Click the Format drop-down box at the bottom below Find and select Highlight.
6. Hit the Find Next button.

When you run the search, you’ll see any highlighted text that matches your search term. At this point, click Find Next to cycle through your search results, or press Cancel to close the window.

Find All Highlighted Text

To find all of the text you’ve highlighted in your Word document, repeat the steps above, but eliminate Step 2. You don’t need to use an Advanced Find here, and make sure to leave the Find What box empty.

When you click Find Next, you’ll see the first portion of highlighted text found. Continue to click Find Next to cycle through and see each additional section of highlighted text in your document.

When no further instances are found, you’ll see a message letting you know.

Pack Away Your Highlighter

Fifteen nifty colors, a handy method for finding your highlighted text, and an easy way to remove it afterward—you can pack away your physical highlighter pen and use Word’s highlighter tool to start making notes instead.

For more, take a look at how to find and replace formatting in Word or how to clear all formatting in your Word document.

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