Tracking Changes: Free InCopy Tutorial

Learn how to effectively track, review, and manage text changes using InCopy's "Track Changes" feature, including how to enable tracking, show or hide changes, and accept or reject modifications.

This exercise is excerpted from past InCopy training materials and is compatible with InCopy updates through 2021. To learn current skills in Adobe Creative Cloud and graphic design, check out our graphic design classes in NYC and live online.

Tracking Changes

How It Works

You can track changes such as deleting, adding, or moving text. However, InCopy does not track formatting changes such as applying a style sheet. Once you have a body of text and want to start tracking changes, you must turn on Track Changes by doing the following:

  1. First, make sure the Track Changes toolbar is showing at the top of the screen by going to Window > Track Changes.

  2. Then at the top of the screen, click the Enable Track Changes button enable disable track changes.

Showing/Hiding Changes

Changes are highlighted in a color. Typically, you only want to see changes if you are reviewing them (so you can accept or reject the change). When typing normally, the tracked changes can be visually confusing, so you’ll probably want to hide them. To hide or show tracked changes, click the Show Changes button show changes at the top of the screen. (Make sure you are in Galley or Story view to see the changes.)

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Accepting & Rejecting Changes

When you are viewing the changes, here’s how to accept or reject a change.

  1. Place the text cursor anywhere in a change (which is highlighted in a color).

  2. In the toolbar at the top of the screen, use these buttons to accept or reject changes:

    Accept Change accept change: Accepts the change you are currently in
    Reject Change reject change: Rejects the change you are currently in
    Accept All Changes accept all changes: Accepts all changes
    Reject All Changes reject all changes: Rejects all changes
  3. Once you’ve accepted or rejected a change, the colored highlight disappears.

    NOTE: To navigate between the changes without having to find them yourself, use the Next Change next change or Previous Change previous change buttons in the toolbar at the top of the screen.

The Change Info Panel

You can see additional information about a change such as:

  • Who made the change.
  • When the change was made.
  • What the change was (added text, deleted text, moved text).

To see this info, open the Change Info panel by going into Window > Change Info.

change info panel

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Dan Rodney

Dan Rodney has been a designer and web developer for over 20 years. He creates coursework for Noble Desktop and teaches classes. In his spare time Dan also writes scripts for InDesign (Make Book JacketProper Fraction Pro, and more). Dan teaches just about anything web, video, or print related: HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Figma, Adobe XD, After Effects, Premiere Pro, Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, and more.

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