Google Chrome is making it easier to share specific parts of long PDFs

January 5, 2025

Chrome

Google is adding the Text Fragment feature to its PDF reader to make it easier to share specific parts of long PDFs.

The Text Fragment feature in Google Chrome lets you share a link to a specific part of a webpage. You select the text you want to highlight, and it creates a link. When someone clicks the link, it takes them to the exact text and highlights it.

Right now, this feature doesn’t work with PDFs, but Google is working on adding it to the PDF reader in Chrome.

This was spotted by Leo on X (Twitter) through a Chromium code commit.

Chrome Text Fragments — **Copy Link to Highlight aka Text Fragments in Chrome**

According to Chromium Gerrit's reference, you'll be soon able to select text in a PDF, click on Copy link to highlight to create a link, and share it, making it easier for everyone to access exactly what they need.

Google is still testing the idea, so we don't know when it will begin rolling out in the stable branch.

In addition to supporting text fragments in the PDF viewer, Google is working on improving tab grouping and scam detection with AI. Google is also expected to deeply integrate Gemini Live into Chrome.