CopyQ — The Complete Guide: Searchable Clipboard History for Work Across Sheets, Programs and Reports
CopyQ is an advanced open-source clipboard manager for Windows, macOS and Linux. It keeps everything you copied — text, HTML and images — and lets you search, edit and paste earlier items. When you move dozens of values from an analysis program to a calculation sheet and from there to a report, there is no need to go back and copy again.
CopyQ
CopyQ project
Clipboard history with search and editing — move values between calculation sheets, programs and reports without re-copying.
Get it from the vendorWhat you get
- Full history — text, HTML and images.
- Search and edit — find an old value and fix it before pasting.
- Tabs, notes and tags — organise items by project or topic.
- Keyboard shortcuts — fast access without the mouse.
- Ignored windows — skip content from windows you choose, such as a password manager.
Who it suits
Anyone who copies a lot: analysis results, clause numbers from a standard, addresses and land parcel numbers. A fixed tab with values that recur in every project also turns it into a small snippet library. Advanced users get a command-line interface and scripting.
Related tools
For a simpler Windows-only alternative — Ditto. For text expansion from triggers — Espanso. For the calculation sheet — LibreOffice.
Ditto
Ditto project
Clipboard history for Windows — everything you copy is saved, so earlier values and text can be found and pasted again.
Get it from the vendorEspanso
Federico Terzi
Text expander — type a short trigger and get a standard paragraph, a date, a formula or an email template.
Get it from the vendor
LibreOffice
The Document Foundation
A full office suite — documents, spreadsheets, presentations and drawings, compatible with Office files.
Get it from the vendor
Qalculate!
Hanna Knutsson
A smart desktop calculator — full unit conversion, physical constants, uncertainty propagation and symbolic algebra.
Get it from the vendorThe bottom line
CopyQ turns the clipboard from a one-item memory into a searchable archive. Open source and free for commercial use too.