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The Gmail web client used to have a "lab" feature called Quote Selected Text. It seems to be gone. Is there any way to get back that functionality?

When enabled, it allowed me to highlight a bunch of text in a message I was reading. Then when I hit reply, just the highlighted text was included in my reply message, not the whole message buried in the [...] item.

I know it's not for everyone, but I really liked this feature. It allowed me to respond to emails in a style like this, which was easier to read than the usual chain of included messages.

What happened to Quote Selected Text?

I don't know, I'll try to find out.

Did the Gmail team say anything about getting rid of the feature?

If so, I didn't hear about it.

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  • it also allowed to get rid of the quote at all easily — having selected just one word you had only this word to be removed and blank input plate then. I start to think Google has passed its peak of being useful. Never they had been listening to users as well I have to add. Amen
    – poige
    Aug 13 '17 at 9:01
  • Should be possible to write a userscript with this functionality. Pleeease!
    – d-b
    Sep 11 '17 at 16:45
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    I used this every day. Argh!
    – Justin L
    Sep 14 '17 at 8:18
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No, there is no way to regain this functionality natively in Gmail.

The Quote Selected Text lab in Gmail was retired along with several other labs as announced in this Google blog post. The list of labs retired at that time included "Authentication Icon, Google Voice Player, Picasa previews, Pictures in chat, Quick Links, Quote Selected Text, Smartlabels, and Yelp previews."

I'm sorry, but you'll need to look for a 3rd party solution for this functionality. It is no longer natively available in Gmail.

As mentioned at the top of Gmail labs "Labs is a testing ground for experimental features that aren't quite ready for primetime. They may change, break or disappear at any time."

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