The option to pick several parts of text at once is coming to Google Docs, and it might save you a lot of time when it comes to correctly formatting your document. If you have two sentences separated by a header, or if you wish to apply the same effect to three distinct words in a paragraph, you may now do so by selecting all of the text and making your changes at once.

To select several text parts, just pick the first chunk of text as usual, then hit either the Command or Control key, depending on whether you’re using a Mac or a Windows system. Continue to keep it down while you pick the remaining text. After you’ve selected everything, you may let go and use the toolbar to adjust the formatting elements you desire.

It’s a little detail, but if you have a lot of text to format, this capability will be far more convenient than, instance, the format painter tool, which allows you to highlight one piece of text and copy its formatting to another. While the tool eliminates the need to adjust each parameter individually, depending on how many bits of text you’re attempting to modify, it may still necessitate a lot more clicks.

The function may also be used for tasks other than formatting, such as cutting and moving a few paragraphs, or adding a comment that applies to numerous phrases. It’s simple with multi-select.

There are a few circumstances in which employing the function isn’t the best choice. If you’re trying to modify every header in your document, for example, you’d be better off updating the style rather than manually selecting each one. You may accomplish this by formatting one header as desired, then going up to the style section, selecting the header level, and clicking “Update [style] to match.”

While multi-select may not be the best tool for every occasion, it’s excellent that Google has included it as a choice — especially because other desktop program word processors don’t appear to have it (if you know how to pull this off in Apple Pages, please let me know). Google claims the functionality will progressively roll out to everyone’s accounts over the next 15 days, so you shouldn’t have to wait too long if you don’t have it yet.