Notepad's New Formatting Irks Users, Opens Niche for Simple Text Editors.
User frustration with Windows Notepad not adding text formatting features like Markdown support shows a consistent demand for true minimalist, plain-text editors. This opens up a market opportunity for new or existing simple text editors to brand themselves as the 'no-frills' option, highlighting speed, simplicity, and the ability to strip formatting. Marketing can focus on developers, writers, and casual users who appreciated Notepad's original, uncluttered functionality and its usefulness for quickly removing formatting from copied text.
Origin Reddit Post
r/technology
Text Formatting in Notepad begin rolling out to Windows Insiders
Posted by u/kintaro__oe•06/01/2025
Top Comments
u/Trentskiroonie
>Its implementing markup syntax.
Minor correction: they're adding support for Markdown, which is a specific kind of markup syntax.
u/AvgSizedPotato
The whole reason I use notepad is to quickly copy code or commands from one system to another with zero formatting.
It's already annoying that notepad tries to spell check things now or int
u/muffinmanman123
If you aren't using Notepad++ you're doing it wrong anyway.
u/ComingInSideways
Yup, once again MS complicating things unnecessarily. If this runs as well as Office formatting worked, I will just use Notepad++ instead, or Sublime or Zed.
Just put Wordpad if you want for
u/mopslik
Why can't it be more like [ed](https://www.gnu.org/fun/jokes/ed-msg.en.html)?
u/Spiritual-Matters
The main reason I use Notepad is because it’s light and snappy. This better remain
u/Platypus_Dundee
This right here
u/danieljai
You can turn that off in settings. Notepad > Settings (upper right Gear icon) > When Notepad Starts > Start new session and discard unsaved changed.
u/HR_Paperstacks_402
Is it really any different? They are just file formats you can save to. Wordpad could have saved to this format and already had the formatting functionality that they are now having to build
u/SkillPatient
It's not the same was wordpad. Its implementing markdown syntax. While wordpad was a rich text format editor.
u/EnoughDatabase5382
So, this means that if you simply press Control + V, it will paste the content into Notepad while keeping the original formatting, right? Is that a feature people are really asking for in Not
u/shadowstrlke
Or have no choice because you work for companies with shit IT rules.
u/anti-torque
agreed
plain text is why I use it
u/withwhichwhat
I'm picturing the old markup symbols in Wordperfect.
That makes me nostalgic.
u/PM_ME_STUFF_N_THINGS
Splitting hairs a bit
u/kintaro__oe
Personally, I'm already annoyed by it saving every session when closed by default.
u/HR_Paperstacks_402
So they are re-inventing Wordpad after getting rid of it?
The appeal of Notepad was always the fact it only supported plain-text files.
u/Somepotato
Outside of Office, use Ctrl shift v to paste without formatting.
u/ThistleroseTea
Wasn't this the entire point of **Wordpad**?
u/ew73
One of the primary things I use Notepad for is specifically to strip formatting when I paste.
u/vinciblechunk
Notepad spent most of its existence not even being able to edit files larger than 32K and now they're swinging it way too far in the other direction
u/Trentskiroonie
The real reason they're doing this is because all the chat bots output Markdown, and until now, Windows didn't ship with anything that could display Markdown.
Like most things these days, it
u/kintaro__oe
I can't really understand this decision. Notepad should just be like the Text Editor on Linux.
u/sekh60
It is the standard editor.
u/prometheusg
LPT: Ctrl-shift-v pastes without formatting in many applications.