This article is more than 5 years old.

search-tip-ctrl-f

The scene: you, doing your research, scanning a long article online, searching for a specific word. You scroll up and down, back and forth, looking for that word, but no luck. Guess what? No longer do you need to waste your time trying to find that word hidden among all those other words in that long document. There’s a very simple trick and here it is:

Ctrl+F. Yes, that’s right: Ctrl+F. Simple, right?

Control-F (or Command-F) lets you look for – or find – a word somewhere on a page. This keyboard shortcut works in all web browsers and for other documents too (think PDF or a Word doc for example). When you hit Ctrl+F, a small “find” box will pop up somewhere in your browser where you can type in exactly what you’re looking for. The word (or phrase) will be highlighted and, if it’s outside the current screen, the page will jump to where the word is.

So, next time you’re searching for a word on a web page, remember: Ctrl+F.