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How to convert text to table in Pages 8?

There used to be a neat trick you could do to convert text into a table just by copy-pasting it into an empty table with tabs as cell markers. It seems like either I have something disabled, or the newest version doesn't allow for that anymore. What happens when I post tabbed text into a table (in both Numbers and Pages) is that it all pastes into the same cell, but with the tabs inside the cell.

Any way to fix this?

MacBook Air 13", macOS 10.14

Posted on Jun 2, 2019 4:58 AM

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The text must be tab delineated, and when you post into a table cell, you only click once to select the target cell, and then use Paste and Match Style. If you double-click on the cell, then you have accessed the text content, and your paste will reflect as you have shown above. The other issue is if you are using a programmer's editor that replaces tabs with spaces, then your paste will also appear as you have shown because no tabs are present.


If you enter the tab delineated data in a Text box, you can copy and use Paste and Match Style to populate the table starting with the first cell.


I wrote a guide on this for Pages v5, but it should still apply to Pages 8.

Posted on Jun 2, 2019 5:33 AM

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Question marked as Best answer

Jun 2, 2019 5:33 AM in response to Autotheistic

The text must be tab delineated, and when you post into a table cell, you only click once to select the target cell, and then use Paste and Match Style. If you double-click on the cell, then you have accessed the text content, and your paste will reflect as you have shown above. The other issue is if you are using a programmer's editor that replaces tabs with spaces, then your paste will also appear as you have shown because no tabs are present.


If you enter the tab delineated data in a Text box, you can copy and use Paste and Match Style to populate the table starting with the first cell.


I wrote a guide on this for Pages v5, but it should still apply to Pages 8.

How to convert text to table in Pages 8?

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