The Unwanted Typography
When typing in Google Docs, you might occasionally notice that straight quotation marks (” and ‘) are automatically converted into curly, directional quotation marks (“ ” and ‘ ’). These are known as “smart quotes” or “typographer’s quotes.” They are designed to make standard prose look more professional and polished, resembling text you would see in a printed book. However, if you are using Google Docs to write code snippets, HTML, or specific data formatting scripts, smart quotes will absolutely break your syntax. Programming languages require straight quotes to function correctly, making Docs’ automatic substitution highly detrimental for technical writing.
Disabling Smart Quotes in Preferences
To ensure your quotation marks remain strictly as straight characters and stop Google Docs from automatically making smart quotes, you must adjust the application’s formatting preferences.
Open the Google Docs document you are currently editing. Move your cursor to the top menu bar, click on Tools, and select Preferences from the drop-down menu that appears. A preferences dialog box will open. Ensure that the General tab is selected at the top. Look through the list of checkboxes for an option labeled Use smart quotes. By default, this box is checked, which enables the automatic conversion. Click the checkbox to uncheck it. Finally, click the blue OK button at the bottom right corner of the window to apply the changes. From this point forward, whenever you type a quotation mark or an apostrophe on your keyboard, Google Docs will input the standard, straight character without attempting to reformat it.