Make, copy, and search multiple concurrent text selections.
Make multiple noncontiguous text selections at a time in webpages. Text can be copied to clipboard through ctrl+c or the right-click copy option. You can also search your text on Google, YouTube, and Wikipedia through the right click selection menu.
Usage
Make additional text selections while holding down ctrl. Clear all selections by clicking without holding ctrl. Undo the most recent selection with ctrl+z. On Macs, use cmd instead of ctrl.
Lock selections with ctrl+shift+L. When selections are locked, they will not disappear when left-clicking. This prevents accidentally clicking out and clearing your selections. While locked, ctrl/cmd is not needed to make selections. Leave locked mode and clear all highlighted text by pressing ctrl+shift+L again.
Right click any selection for search options. Select MultiSearch to open a search tab for each selection. Select CombinedSearch to open a single search tab for each selection separated by a space. Right click the extension icon in the Chrome toolbar (top-right of the browser) and select options to enable or disable the context menu search options.
Select the extension icon to toggle copy options. If 'Copy With Newline' is selected, each selection will be separated by a newline when copying. If 'Copy With Spaces' is selected, each selection will be separated by spaces when copying. If 'Copy With Bullets' is selected, each selection will be copied as a bullet point.
Notes
- The extension is automatically disabled by Chrome in the store description. Try it out on other sites.
- Refresh any current tabs when first installing to activate the extension on those pages. This is not necessary for new tabs.
- When selecting separate words throughout a web page, you can double-click while holding ctrl instead of dragging to select.
- When making overlapping selections, ctrl+z will remove the combined selection.
- Selections are sent to the clipboard and searched in the order they are selected.
- Copied selections will be in plain text.
- A single selection containing text on separate lines will be treated as multiple selections when MultiSearching. This keeps you from having to individually select multiple lines that are grouped together.
Updates
- 3/23/21: Removed unused clipboardWrite permission
- 4/15/19: Swapped ctrl with cmd for Mac users
- 5/1/19: Added selection lock with shift+L, see usage for details
- 5/11/19: Replaced shift-L with ctrl+shift+L to prevent accidental activation
- 5/18/19: Added search options for YouTube and Wikipedia
- 6/22/19: Made selections crossing multiple bullets, lines, and hyperlinks possible. Fixed copy options reverting on new pages.
- 7/12/19: Fixed bug where undoing with an active selection would expand the selection instead of removing
- 9/8/19: Users no longer need to hold down ctrl for the first selection. Only additional selections need to be made with ctrl. Fixed bug where search options wouldn't appear the first time in the context menu. Fixed bug when clearing a single selection.
- 9/28/19: Fixed bug where keyboard shortcuts for copying on Google Sheets would fail. Fixed bug when clearing selections in locked mode.
- 10/2/19: Selections are now draggable
Issues
- Selections made on dynamic content sometimes have problems while copying
- Selections crossing multiple elements can rarely include collapsed text.
- Some types of selections cannot be copied or searched. Undo such a selection or refresh to continue.
- Selections are rarely not cleared after clicking. Re-select the text and clear, or refresh the page if this happens.
Privacy
This extension does not collect any information. All data used in this extension is stored locally and temporarily, on the user's computer. The extension's code can be viewed in the linked GitHub repository.
Latest reviews
- (2023-11-04) Xiomara Vigoa: So far so good
- (2023-08-15) Mamad Nobari: Wanted it for Wikipedia and works great for that. Made my job way easier. But doesn't seem to really work well with other websites which is a downside. But helps a lot with Wiki.
- (2023-07-07) Matthew LoPresti (Crono): Great utility for my particular needs. Request: any chance we can get user-defined line-break characters? I'd give several dollars for a "Copy with ;(space)" option.
- (2023-07-03) Goutham: Not working in some websites.
- (2023-07-03) kirubakaran: it is not working after the recent chrome update
- (2023-06-22) Saturnit3: Works ok but for some reason this extension will make the youtube search bar lose focus(searchbar becomes unwritable for 3 seconds, need to reclick on the searchbar again to begin typing) on reloading the page or entering the site. It took me some time to realize what extension was the culprit and this was it.
- (2023-03-25) Robert Andrews: Doesn't work
- (2023-02-06) C C: It work, thank you. But I have one problem. When I keep to hold down the 'ctrl' key and select multi words, it doesn't work. So I have to keep to release and re-press down the 'ctrl' key while selecting each words. can it be solved? and I also found another bug. when I go to google search website, it make the cursor focus lose from the search box.
- (2022-08-25) Roy Guerrero: Doesn't work.
- (2022-07-22) Mohammad Reza Rohani: It's not working, if it worksfor anyone please help me, how can i use it_
- (2022-05-11) Rafał Grzejszczyk: Stopped working
- (2022-05-04) Sophia Benson: Does not work on mac
- (2022-02-20) Gaurav Chaudhari: good extension please keep extension in support It would be great if work on pdf and docs file
- (2022-01-29) J.: I needed a fix, and this does nothing. Holding control, right clicks my cursor, so I can't highlight anything. Does not work.
- (2021-12-23) Travis Button: Good for most webpages but does not work in Google Docs which is specifically where I wanted this functionality. Can't believe it's just build into Docs like any other word processing application.
- (2021-12-12) nemodynia: Works great, it's simple as holding down CTRL key, no need to tinker with settings; just install it and forget it's there.
- (2021-11-22) Aaron: It's good and apply my need... but can't multi-selec on some website.... hope it could fix... 2nd hope could customize the seperate symbol... thanks !
- (2021-11-12) Pat MySecret: I'm seeing that it will work the first round, and then my copy function gets impaired. I find my Multiple Selection extension much more reliable.
- (2021-07-31) Curtis Jackson: Doesn't work on Mac. In desperation I tried both holding ctrl and holding cmd. On a web page, I select some text in paragraph 1. I then go down to paragraph 2 and hold cmd while selecting text there. The first selection in paragraph 1 instantly is unselected. The functionality is exactly as if the extension weren't installed at all. Chrome version: 92.0.4515.107 (Official Build) (x86_64) I have my Mac set to use three-finger drag for text selection. I don't see how that could be the problem, but I thought I'd mention it for completeness. I am bitterly disappointed because I REALLY REALLY would love for this extension to work!
- (2021-07-31) ahmad yousaf: helpfull
- (2021-07-04) Alex Gene: excellent. frustrating to copy on the description only to read that chrome doesn;t allow, checked in wikipedia and works like a charm. great. being a uni student = GREAT EXTENSION
- (2021-06-26) Run King: Awesome.
- (2021-05-27) Alexander O.: Not working with sites built on frames (tag <iframe>).
- (2021-05-18) Sterling Draven: Does as it says. Can't ask for more than that, other than that this should already be a basic component in any and all browsers to begin with, but that's Google's idiocy. 5 stars :)
- (2021-05-15) Mohamed Anan: This is COOL, I would like to have "Lock" in the icon instead of shortcut
- (2021-05-13) Yusuf ÜNVER: Copy with spaces does not work. I mean no paragraph structure stays. It removes all paragraph spaces. can you add copying with paragraph spaces. Thanks
- (2021-04-13) Asim Zaman: AMAZING WORK! I just cannot believe that WHY ON EARTH is this not a default feature on chrome! Please Please Please add this functionality on google docs!
- (2021-02-27) riktigt namn: Doesn't work to print the multiple selections with Control-P.
- (2021-02-18) doesnt work on chrome 88 macOS 10.14
- (2021-02-03) Ted Lietz: Works well, thank you!
- (2021-01-26) bipbopking: Doesn't work... can't select only parts of text...
- (2020-11-29) Nikita Kolesnikov: The idea is so great but it doesn't work for PDF files opened in browser and some sites. Hope this functionality will appear sometime
- (2020-11-16) Thor Kverndal: Seems to work in most sites. I downloaded it in the hope it would work on google docs, alas, it doesn't. Would love to see a google docs add-on which does this
- (2020-11-14) PokéKid: I enjoy the ctrl and ctrl lock addition that I can now use, however, if you lock it and highlight something you don't want to highlight, you can't unhighlight that specific area while keeping what you do want highlighted. Could a de-select option be added or is there a de-select extension known that could be used? Furthermore, I have noticed that you cannot drag-and-drop highlighted text from a webpage. Could this be fixed? Thank you in advance.
- (2020-10-21) Benrobin: It was working on some other sites, but it's not on blogger.com. I always write an article using the blogger text editor. I tried this extension, but it's not working. Hopefully, you will support multiline text selection on blogger. Thanks.
- (2020-10-09) Gavin Downs: Works perfect, thanks
- (2020-09-15) Mario Maus: Really neat tool and underrated functionality! This should be in chrome by default. Note: Text selection looks a little different (smaller highlighting box), but not a real issue here. Don't forget to reload the page after installing the extension.
- (2020-08-17) Mohammed Abdul Hai Zahid: not working :(
- (2020-07-23) S P: Great, works! Love the paste with bullet point option!! I'm using the latest version of chrome and not having any issues.
- (2020-04-06) Kavin Duraiarasu: good
- (2020-02-27) Laki Titiko: Doesn't work on Chrome.
- (2020-02-23) Fan Luo: Does not work for Mac, because ctrl-click is right click, and can not make multi-selection.
- (2019-12-28) Fritjof Larsson: Awesome.
- (2019-12-15) Parul Pawar: Life saver, using for Evernote clipper selection option.
- (2019-11-20) Ethan M: Perfect!
- (2019-11-18) Nathaniel: Excellent tool for productivity!
- (2019-11-05) TheWaffleLord: Works flawlessly. Incredible add-on :D
- (2019-09-30) Jeshua: You did a very great job! I'm waiting for the update to be able to work on editable text areas, like in Gmail, Google Docs, etc.
- (2019-09-05) Leslie Lemon: Does not work on Chromium Version 76.0.3809.132 (Official Build) snap (64-bit) any website and after restarting browser and shift refreshing pages.
- (2019-08-01) alex nixon: Very useful. Copy with multiline is a good idea. It pastes in multiple carets in vscode and phpstorm.