Take Screenshots with the Snipping Tool

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About this lesson

Use the Snipping Tool to take screenshots and paste them into other applications.

Quick reference

Take Screenshots with the Snipping Tool

Take a screenshot of all or part of the screen using the Snipping Tool. 

When to use

We use the Snipping Tool whenever we want to take a screenshot of an entire window or a region and paste it into another application. 

Instructions

The Snipping Tool

The Snipping Tool is a small application in Windows 11 that helps us take screenshots and paste them elsewhere. This is useful in many scenarios. For example, maybe we are putting together an instruction manual on Microsoft Excel and we need to take screen grabs of the ribbons and menus. Or, maybe we have received an error message on our PC and we want to screenshot it so we can send it to the IT Team. 

There are two scenarios where using the Snipping Tool is useful. 

  • Click the Start button or press the Win key. 
  • Scroll to 'S' or type Snipping Tool into the search bar. 

The Snipping Tool window will open. We have a menu running across the top that allows us to choose some settings for our snip. 

Choose a Mode

The first thing to do is choose a mode.

Rectangle mode means we can select a rectangular area to snip. This is good for things like error messages and dialog boxes. Window mode will snip the current active window. Full screen mode will snip the entire screen and any open applications on it. Free-form mode allows us to select a custom area to snip. 

  • Select the required mode from the list. 

Delay

Next, we choose if we want to delay the snip by 3, 5, or 10 seconds or if we want No delay.

When we delay the snip, the screenshot won't be taken until the number of seconds selected has passed. This is useful if we are trying to snip something that takes a few clicks to get to.

For example, I might want to snip a menu that is hidden under another menu. I need a few seconds to get to the correct menu before the snip is taken. 

  • Choose a delay (if required)

Take a Snip

We are now ready to take a snip. In this example, I have selected the Rectangle Mode and No Delay. 

  • Click New. 

Notice the screen fades out and the cursor changes to a crosshair. We can now drag the crosshair over the area of the screen we want to snip. When we let go, the snipped area will load into the editor window so we can make changes. 

Edit the Snip

We can use the icons on the editing menu to make changes to the snip. We can use the Ballpoint pen and Highlighter icons to make ink annotations on the snip. We can use the Eraser to remove annotations. We can draw straight lines with the help of the Ruler and we can Crop the image. 

Save or Copy the Snip

Once we have edited the snip, we may want to save it and use it later or we might want to copy it immediately and paste it into another application like Word or PowerPoint. 

Save the Snip
  • Click the Save icon or press CTRL+S. 
  • Navigate to the correct folder. 
  • Click Save. 

Snips are images and will be saved as PNG files. 

Copy the Snip
  • Click the Copy icon or press CTRL+C. 

This will copy the snip to the Windows 11 clipboard. We can then open up another application and press CTRL+V to paste the snip.

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  • 00:03 The Snipping Tool is a small but useful tool in Windows 11 that allows
  • 00:08 us to take screenshots, either of the full screen or
  • 00:12 parts of the screen, and paste them into other applications.
  • 00:16 If you've ever used a third party tool like Snagit,
  • 00:19 then the Snipping Tool is Microsoft's version.
  • 00:21 So let's take a look at how it works.
  • 00:24 Now, open on the screen at the moment I just have a very simple Word document.
  • 00:28 And this might be some kind of instruction manual.
  • 00:32 So I want to explain to users how they can use the ribbon in Microsoft Word.
  • 00:37 And it might be that in order to illustrate my point, I want to add
  • 00:41 a screenshot of the actual ribbon, and I can do this using the Snipping Tool.
  • 00:46 So the first thing we need to do here is we need to locate our Snipping Tool.
  • 00:50 So once again, I'm going to press the Windows logo key.
  • 00:54 This might be something that you have pinned in this list, or
  • 00:57 you might have to search for it.
  • 01:00 So let's go into All apps, and this time, I'm going to use the search bar.
  • 01:03 So let's search for snipping, and there it is, it comes right up.
  • 01:08 So let's launch the Snipping Tool.
  • 01:10 Now, when you're using this Snipping Tool, we have a few different choices.
  • 01:14 And the first area that we want to go to is this one here, the mode.
  • 01:18 So if we click the dropdown, we get to choose what kind of snip we want to take.
  • 01:23 So is the snip that we want to take rectangular?
  • 01:27 Do we want to snip the entire window?
  • 01:30 Do we want to use it in full screen mode, or do we want to use the free form mode?
  • 01:35 Now, because this is the ribbon that I want to take a screenshot of,
  • 01:38 I'm going to use the rectangle mode.
  • 01:41 So let's make sure that we select that first.
  • 01:44 We can then choose if we want a delay.
  • 01:46 Now, mine is set to no delay.
  • 01:48 But for example, if I wanted to take a screenshot of a menu that's
  • 01:53 hidden beneath another menu, it's going to take me a few seconds to get to
  • 01:58 exactly the area that I want to take the snip of.
  • 02:02 So I might want to delay the snip by three or
  • 02:04 five seconds to give me time to get to the correct point in the application.
  • 02:09 So let's say no delay for this one, and then I can choose New.
  • 02:13 Now, notice that the screen completely grays out and
  • 02:16 the cursor changes to a cross here.
  • 02:18 So this now means that I can go in and
  • 02:21 I can take a snip of whatever it is that I want.
  • 02:24 So I'm just going to do part of this ribbon, let's drag it over what we need,
  • 02:29 so I'm just going to do it to there, let's let go.
  • 02:32 And it's going to open it in the Snipping Tool editor.
  • 02:37 So from here, I can make changes to this snip.
  • 02:40 So it might be that I want to highlight the home ribbon, or maybe I want to add
  • 02:45 some text onto this snip before pasting it into my Word document.
  • 02:50 Now, notice right at the top we have some different tools that we can use.
  • 02:55 For example, I can choose to use the ballpoint pen, and I'm going to leave it
  • 02:59 on red, and I could maybe highlight specific things on this snip.
  • 03:03 I also have a highlighter tool that I can use to highlight specific things,
  • 03:08 and I also have an eraser tool just here as well.
  • 03:11 So if I want to erase what I just did, I can do that.
  • 03:14 We have a ruler which will help us draw straight lines.
  • 03:17 So I can select the ruler, select my pen, and
  • 03:20 then I can effectively draw a straight line across the snip.
  • 03:24 If I have a touchscreen device and I'm using a stylus,
  • 03:27 I can put it into touch writing mode if I want to use that.
  • 03:31 We have a crop tool so we can adjust the size.
  • 03:36 So if I want to drag this in a little bit, I can do that, and click on the tick.
  • 03:39 And we then have Undo and Redo at the top.
  • 03:42 So we can really customize our snip,
  • 03:44 it's not a full customization process like it is in an application like Snagit, but
  • 03:49 we can make minor changes and then we can choose what we want to do with this snip.
  • 03:54 Now, in this case, I want to paste this directly into my Word document.
  • 03:59 And if we take a look up in the right-hand corner, I can choose to save this as
  • 04:03 an image file and all of your snips will be saved as .pngs.
  • 04:07 Or we can copy the snip, which is effectively like doing a Ctrl+C.
  • 04:10 Now, this is the option we're going to choose, but before we leave this area,
  • 04:15 let's take a look at the last couple of options.
  • 04:18 We can choose to share the snip with somebody else, and
  • 04:21 then underneath those three dots, we have more settings.
  • 04:24 So if we want to take a quick look at our settings, we can go into here and
  • 04:28 we can make customizations where required.
  • 04:31 Now, I want to copy, so I'm going to click on the Copy button.
  • 04:35 I'm then going to go back to Word, get myself onto a new line.
  • 04:39 And all I need to do is paste, Ctrl+V, and it's going to paste that in.
  • 04:45 I can then make further changes to this from within Word itself.
  • 04:49 So if I want to make this stand out a bit more,
  • 04:51 I could put a border around the entire picture.
  • 04:54 So let's click on the picture, Picture Format, and
  • 04:57 I'm going to just put a black border around the outside.
  • 05:00 So it's really nice and easy to take a snip of a certain area of your screen.
  • 05:06 Let's take a look at a couple of other options.
  • 05:09 Now, notice that my Snipping Tool is still open in the taskbar.
  • 05:12 So if I click this,
  • 05:14 I'm going to click the New button because I want to do a new snip.
  • 05:19 Now, from here, I can also modify the type of snip that I'm doing.
  • 05:23 So the default here is to do what we did last time, the rectangular snip, but
  • 05:28 we can snip a freeform snip, a window snap or the fullscreen.
  • 05:33 So if I choose fullscreen,
  • 05:34 it's just going to take that snip of the entire screen that I currently have open.
  • 05:41 I can then choose to copy that, go back to my Word document, Ctrl+V to paste it in.
  • 05:46 Now, maybe this time I want to do more of a freeform snip.
  • 05:50 So let's click on snipping again, let's click on New.
  • 05:54 And this time, I'm going to select freeform snip.
  • 05:58 So now, I can kind of draw a freeform area over the screen,
  • 06:03 let go, and it's going to snip that.
  • 06:07 Let's copy it again, go down and paste it, Ctrl+V, into our document.
  • 06:13 Now, that obviously doesn't look particularly great, but
  • 06:16 hopefully you get the idea that can be useful sometimes.
  • 06:19 The important points here are to have the application that you want to snip from
  • 06:24 already open when you open up the Snipping Tool.
  • 06:27 Because once you have that Snipping Tool open,
  • 06:29 you can't switch to other applications.

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