As a writer, you’re always looking for ways to improve your craft and streamline your workflow. Fortunately, Windows offers several native features that can help you become a more efficient and productive writer and make writing easier.
Content
- 1. Back Up Work Using OneDrive Cloud Sync
- 2. Hear Your Words Come Alive With Narrator
- 3. Dictate Your Thoughts Using Speech Recognition
- 4. Let Copilot Be Your Personal Writing Assistant
- 5. Speed Up Your Workflow with Keyboard Shortcuts
- 6. Eliminate Distractions With the Help of Focus Sessions
- 7. Organize Your Workspace with Virtual Desktops
- 8. Capture and Annotate Screenshots with Snipping Tool
1. Back Up Work Using OneDrive Cloud Sync
Every writer’s worst nightmare is losing hours, days, or even weeks of work due to accidentally deleting a file or a hard drive failure on your PC. Fortunately, Windows includes OneDrive, Microsoft’s cloud backup solution, that can help prevent such catastrophic losses. By automatically syncing your files to the cloud, OneDrive keeps your work easily accessible from any device with an Internet connection.
Enabling OneDrive is a breeze. Click the Start button, type “OneDrive,” and launch the application. If you’re new to the Microsoft ecosystem, you’ll be prompted to sign in with your Microsoft account. Existing users can simply log in with their credentials. While OneDrive is generally reliable, I recommend learning how to troubleshoot OneDrive sync issues so that you can fix them as soon as you encounter them.
2. Hear Your Words Come Alive With Narrator
Proofreading is an essential part of the writing process, and hearing your words read aloud is one of the best ways to catch errors and improve the flow of your text. Windows comes has a native feature, Narrator, that can help you with your writing.
Narrator is a screen-reading application that can read aloud any text on your screen. To trigger Narrator, enable the feature via Settings -> Accessibility -> Narrator, then press Windows + Ctrl + Enter. You can also adjust the speed and voice of the narration and choose from multiple voices.
Tip: learn how to use the Windows text-to-speech feature in Narrator.
3. Dictate Your Thoughts Using Speech Recognition
Even experienced writers typically max out at around 80 words per minute on a text file. In comparison, the average person speaks at a rate of around 130 words per minute. Needless to say, dictation is a great way to boost your writing output, and Windows includes this feature natively.
As explained in greater detail in this guide on voice typing in Windows, start dictating by pressing Windows + H, causing the dictation toolbar to appear, then click the microphone button or press Windows + H again, and Windows will begin listening and transcribing your words. If you need to pause or resume dictation, click the microphone button or press Windows + H again.
4. Let Copilot Be Your Personal Writing Assistant
Microsoft’s AI-powered chatbot, Copilot, is making its way into a growing number of Microsoft apps. You can even find it in Word, a favorite writing tool. To activate this digital writing assistant, click the Copilot icon.
From there, describe what you’d like to write, including any notes or outlines you have, and Copilot will generate text suggestions to kickstart or reignite your writing process. It doesn’t stop there: Copilot can even generate content based on your existing Word or PowerPoint files so that you can, for example, use it to quickly extract insights from articles you wrote years ago, then use the insights in a new article.
5. Speed Up Your Workflow with Keyboard Shortcuts
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As a writer, you likely perform many tasks over and over again, such as copying and pasting text, deleting lines, and undoing mistakes. While it’s convenient that Windows makes it possible to perform these tasks using the graphical user interface, it’s much faster to use keyboard shortcuts.
The following list includes ten keyboard shortcuts that are highly useful for writers:
| Action | Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Copy | Ctrl + C |
| Paste | Ctrl + V |
| Cut | Ctrl + X |
| Undo | Ctrl + Z |
| Redo | Ctrl + Y |
| Select all | Ctrl + A |
| Find | Ctrl + F |
| Find and replace | Ctrl + Shift + F |
| Move the cursor between words | Ctrl + Left/Right Arrow |
| Select blocks of text | Ctrl + Shift + Arrow Key |
Tip: for a more comprehensive list of Windows keyboard shortcuts, check out our Windows 10 Keyboard Shortcuts Cheatsheet.
6. Eliminate Distractions With the Help of Focus Sessions
Many writers are familiar with the Pomodoro technique, a time management method that breaks work into intervals, typically 25 minutes in length, separated by short breaks. If you find this technique helpful or want to give it a try, then Focus Sessions, a native Clock app feature in Windows, will help you stay on track with your writing.
Focus Sessions help you organize your writing sessions by allowing you to set specific durations for focused work. This minimizes notifications, alerts, and other interruption. To set up a Focus Session, open Settings, and go to System -> Focus. Customize the desired settings, and start your first session.
7. Organize Your Workspace with Virtual Desktops
Writers are often avid multitaskers, juggling writing with research, communication, and other activities. To stay more organized and productive, it helps to separate these activities using multiple virtual desktops.
In Windows 11, you can easily create and manage virtual desktops by clicking the Task view icon next to the Start button. This brings up an overview of your virtual desktops. You can create a new one by clicking the New desktop button.
Once you’ve created a new desktop, open the apps you want to use on that specific desktop. For example, you could have one desktop dedicated to writing, with your word processor and note-taking app open, while another desktop houses your research materials and web browser.
8. Capture and Annotate Screenshots with Snipping Tool
Screenshots are an essential part of many articles, especially those intended for the Web, such as this one. While there are numerous feature-rich screenshot tools for Windows, the native Snipping Tool feature can often get the job done.
The Snipping Tool allows you to capture various types of screenshots, including free-form, rectangular, window, and full-screen snips. You can even capture video clips of a specific portion of your screen. Once you’ve captured a snip, it’s automatically copied to the Snipping Tool window, where you can make changes, save, and share the image.
To open the Snipping Tool, type “Snipping Tool” in the Start menu search bar, and click on the app. Alternatively, use the keyboard shortcut Windows + Shift + S for a static image snip or Windows + Shift + R for a video snip. If you find yourself using the Snipping Tool frequently, you might want to set the Print Screen button to directly open the Snipping Tool.
Windows offers a wealth of native features that can significantly enhance your writing workflow and boost your productivity. While these native Windows features are incredibly powerful on their own, you can further optimize your writing experience by also exploring third-party apps for Windows.
Image credit: DALL-E. All screenshots by David Morelo.
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David Morelo –
Staff Writer
David Morelo is a professional content writer in the technology niche, covering everything from consumer products to emerging technologies and their cross-industry application. His interest in technology started at an early age and has only grown stronger over the years.
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