Pasting with style in Apple's iWork suite

In Apple's iWork suite, the "Paste and Match Style" or "Paste Style" options, as implied in their names, allow you to paste the style from one element onto another; or to paste an element into a document and to match the style of the document that it's getting pasted to. In many ways, they're the iWork equivalent of "format painter" found in Microsoft Office. And, in many ways, they're much better.

For example, say I'm working on a presentation on my company's frozen banana sales in Keynote. I've created my first slide, with a title of "Frozen Bananas Sold."

But, I also have a Numbers document that I'm working on, and I want to take the "Frozen Bananas Sold" title to have the same font and color as the "Bluth's Frozen Bananas - Balance Sheet." To do this, I'll need to click on the "Bluth's Frozen Bananas - Balance Sheet" element and select "Copy Style" (or command-option-c) from the Format menu within Numbers. Then, I'll need to move back to the Keynote document, click on the "Frozen Bananas Sold" element, and select "Paste Style" (command-option-v) from the Format menu. Now, the title of my Keynote presentation has the same font formatting as title from my Numbers document.

While the "Paste Style" option allows you to apply the style elements from one element onto another, "Paste and Match Style," on the other hand, applies a document's style onto the object that's being pasted. For instance, in my Numbers document, I have a sales chart that I'd like to paste onto my Keynote document.

Unfortunately, the font is dark, which would clash with the colors of my Keynote presentation. With the "Paste and Match Style" option, my chart will take on the style elements of my Keynote document.

Got any iWork tips you'd like to share? Let us know in the comments below.