Replacing a word without catching it inside longer words, and without losing its capitalisation, is fiddly.
Find and Replace Word matches whole words only and can carry the original capitalisation onto the replacement.
How to use Find and Replace Word
- Paste your text into the input box.
- Enter the word to replace, keep Whole word on, and turn on Preserve case to match the original capitalisation.
- Copy the result with each whole-word match replaced.
Use cases
- Renaming a term while leaving similar longer words untouched.
- Swapping a word and keeping sentence-start capitalisation.
- Replacing a name consistently across a draft.
Good to know
Find and Replace Word wraps the search in word boundaries so it changes only standalone words, not substrings inside longer words. With Preserve case on, an all-caps or capitalised match produces an all-caps or capitalised replacement.
Frequently asked questions
Will it change the word inside a longer word?
No. Whole-word matching uses boundaries, so replacing cat leaves category and concatenate untouched.
How does Preserve case work?
An all-caps match becomes an all-caps replacement and a capitalised match stays capitalised, so the style carries over.
Is matching case-sensitive by default?
Whole-word matching ignores case while finding, and Preserve case then restores the original capitalisation on each replacement.