Tips & tricks

Which tab is that playing from? Find it and mute it

The tab that's making sound gives itself away with a little speaker icon — and in Edge and Firefox, one click on it mutes it.

Comparing two versions of a document: see the changes in color

Word and Google Docs can both compare two versions of a file and highlight every difference. No more reading contracts line by line.

Hidden formatting marks: why a document behaves strangely

Ctrl+Shift+8

The ¶ button reveals spaces, tabs, and page breaks. Suddenly you can see exactly why text jumps where it shouldn't — and what to delete.

AutoCorrect as a shortcut dictionary: long names from three letters

Teach Word that “dph” means “value added tax.” AutoCorrect can expand your own custom shortcuts across every Office app.

Stop sites from asking about notifications

The “This site wants to show notifications” popup can be switched off globally with one toggle. Sites stop asking — and you stop dismissing them.

Install a website as an app

Gmail, your calendar, or Teams can run in their own window with an icon on the taskbar — no address bar and no risk of an accidentally closed tab.

Vertical tabs: on a wide monitor, read names, not icons

Edge and Firefox can move your tabs into a column on the side. Twenty tabs with readable titles instead of a row of nameless little teeth.

Turn on a notification for every card payment

A banking-app alert for every charge catches a forgotten subscription or a compromised card in the minute it happens — not a month later on a statement.

A page from computer to phone: QR code or send-to-device

You don't have to email links to yourself. Chrome generates a QR code for a page, and Chrome and Firefox can both send a tab straight to your phone.

Wipe cookies for one site only — and stay logged in everywhere else

A site won't log you in, or it's stuck in a loop? Don't clear your whole history. Cookies can be wiped for just that one troublesome site.

IMPORTRANGE: connect two Google Sheets live

One function pulls data from another spreadsheet into yours — and keeps it current. No more manually copying numbers between files.

A shared shopping list: whoever's in the store buys it

“Buy milk” texted over SMS gets lost. A shared list in Google Keep or Reminders is visible to both partners and updates instantly.

Permanent location sharing: no more “where are you already?” calls

Google Maps and Find My on iPhone can share location between partners continuously. A glance at the map replaces a phone call when picking someone up.

Set up a “Family” calendar — a layer both parents can see

Clubs, dentists, and school events don't belong in your work calendar. A shared Family calendar is visible to both partners, so nothing gets lost in one person's head.

Shared family passwords: no more sending them over chat

A Wi-Fi password, a streaming login, or a utility account password sent as a message is untraceable and unsafe. A shared password group fixes it for good.

Family sharing: buy a paid app once, not twice

Both Apple and Google can share purchased apps and a range of subscriptions across a family. Plenty of households pay twice for the same thing and don't even know it.

Reader mode: an article without ads or popup banners

F9

One click strips ads, menus, and recommended articles off the page. What's left is text and images — like in a book.

The Selection Pane: click an object hidden under everything else

Can't grab an object buried under an image with your mouse? The Selection Pane lists every element on the slide — pick by clicking in the list, not by hunting on the canvas.

Slim down a presentation: compress images right inside PowerPoint

Presentation is 80 MB and won't go through email? Built-in image compression shrinks it to a fraction of the size — two clicks, no visible loss.

Pull just a few pages out of a PDF — by printing to PDF

Need to send three pages out of a fifty-page PDF? Print the range “12-14” to PDF and the new file is born. No installing anything.

Merge multiple PDFs into one — without paying for Acrobat

A contract, an attachment, and a scanned addendum, all in one file: Preview handles it on a Mac, free PDF24 on Windows — just don't upload sensitive documents anywhere.

Free PDF comments: mark up documents without paying for Acrobat

Highlighting and annotating a PDF is handled by the free Acrobat Reader, Edge, and Preview on Mac. Feedback belongs in the file, not in a five-paragraph email.

Fill out a PDF form in your browser — don't print, don't scan

Chrome, Edge, and Firefox can all fill in a PDF form directly. And when the form has no fillable fields, Edge and Firefox just let you type the text straight onto it.

Closed a document without saving? Office can bring it back

Word, Excel, and PowerPoint quietly save copies of your work as you go. File → Info → Manage Document recovers even files you never saved.

A link that jumps straight to one sentence on the page

Select text, right-click, “Copy link to highlight” — the recipient lands exactly on that sentence, highlighted in yellow.

Silence an annoying notification right from the shade

No need to dig through settings: swiping on a notification on iPhone offers an hour of silence; holding one on Android turns off just the annoying category.

Lending your phone? Lock it into one app

Guided Access on iPhone and app pinning on Android keep a phone stuck in a single app — a kid watching a cartoon, a colleague viewing a photo, nothing more.

Text from paper straight into a field: Live Text and Google Lens

Stop retyping details off paper. iPhone can scan text with the camera directly into a text field; Android does the same through Google Lens.

Battery saver turns itself on when your charge drops

Android can trigger battery saver by percentage. iPhone has no built-in schedule — but a Shortcuts automation turns on Low Power Mode entirely on its own.

Share your Wi-Fi password without reading it out loud

iPhone offers to share the password automatically as soon as someone nearby tries to connect. Android generates a QR code that scans and connects.