Pages is not offering the share function

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Level 1

13 points

Pages is not offering the share function

I’m having difficulty getting the share function to be able to copy text without formatting.

When using dark screen mode I want to copy text from a Pages document to paste into a different app, when doing so as a simple copy paste the text comes in black and is unreadable with a black screen background.

Any tips to get the “share” function to copy informatics text would be great. I’ve tried a number of things to get the “share” feature to show, but it will not show in pages. Share function will show in some other apps.

Any feedback appreciated

iPad Pro (5th generation)

Posted on Jun 2, 2025 8:43 AM

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Answer 1

Camelot

Level 9

57,357 points

Jun 4, 2025 1:17 PM in response to 36Jay

I think the copy/paste is due to an inherent difference between text applications.

Pages is geared towards the concept of a printed page. As such, even in Dark Mode, you're generally typing black text on a white page, because that's how it's likely to print (on the assumption you're actually going to print this document).

When you copy text from Pages, you're inherently copying the formatting and style data associated with that text - specifically "this text is black". Consequently, when you paste that text into some other app, it pastes as black text because that is what you copied. You did not copy 'generic, uncolored text that displays as the inverse of the background', you copied text that was specifically black, designed for a white page.

This may contrast with text copied from other applications that are not print-oriented where text is just text and may honor the light/dark mode of your device.

As for Share, I don't think that's going to be a solution for you. Pages does have a sharing feature (via the share icon in the toolbar), but it's designed to share the entire document for either collaboration or distribution. It's not designed to 'share' snippets of data from within the document.

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