Track changes
Track changes is an editing mode in which every insertion and deletion is recorded and shown on the text itself, so that a reviewer can accept or reject each change rather than compare two versions of the document by eye.
- Also called
- Redlining, suggesting mode
- The point
- Unmarked text is untouched text
- Missing from
- Most AI rewrite tools
What it is for
Track changes was built for co-authors and editors. One person edits; the other sees every insertion and deletion marked on the text and accepts or rejects each one. The property that matters is not the colours — it is the guarantee that anything without a mark is exactly what you wrote. That is what lets you review a long document by reading only the marks.
Why AI edits need it more
Ask most AI tools to improve a paragraph and you get a new paragraph. Ask them to revise a chapter and you get a new chapter. That is a different kind of thing from an edit: to find what changed you reread all of it, and then you take the whole copy or none of it.
2 · Method
We surveyed twelve schools over one term.
3 · Results
Screen reading was faster, but recall a week later was lower.
4 · Discussion
This suggests that paper still helps with long texts, in line with earlier studies.
Teachers said the gap was widest on long texts.
Trimmed the method recap and brought two claims in the discussion in line with the data.
2 · Method
As the introduction explained, this study asks whether the reading medium affects recall. We surveyed twelve schools, and the results of the survey were collected over the course of one term over one term.
3 · Results
Screen reading was faster, but recall a week later was lower.
4 · Discussion
This provessuggests that paper still helps with long texts, which is something that many earlier studies have also found, in line with earlier studies.
Teachers noted thatsaid the gap was widest on long texts.
One chapter, three changes, one section left alone. On the left you reread everything to find them; on the right, unmarked text is what you wrote.
On one paragraph that is annoying. On a chapter it is the reason people stop letting AI touch anything that matters, because AI edits have three properties that make an unmarked copy dangerous:
- They are fluent. A rewritten sentence that lost a “not”, a date or a hedge reads just as well as the original. There is nothing to catch your eye unless the change itself is marked.
- They are numerous. A human editor makes the changes they mean to. A model asked to “tighten this” may touch forty sentences to improve six.
- They drop things. Footnotes, citations and links are exactly what a rewrite tends to smooth away, and their absence is invisible in a clean copy.
A tracked change turns all three into something you can see and decide on.
How MindMax handles it
Every AI edit — a rewrite at the cursor, changes you describe in a conversation, a revision from your comments, fixes to a long draft — comes back marked on your own text. A whole-document revision arrives in groups, each with a one-line reason, to accept or reject one by one; a group that drops a footnote, citation or link carries a warning. Your file is untouched until you apply. See tracked AI edits for the review itself, and edits wait for you for the rule behind it.
A rewrite at the cursor, shown as changes inside the paragraph rather than as a new paragraph to compare.
Common questions
What is track changes?
An editing mode in which insertions and deletions are shown on the text itself — typically struck through and highlighted — so a reviewer can accept or reject each change instead of comparing two versions.
Can AI suggest edits as tracked changes, like Word does?
Some tools can. In MindMax every AI edit to your text arrives that way: marked in place, grouped with a reason when it is a whole-document revision, and written only when you accept it.
Can AI write its edits into a Word file as tracked changes?
In MindMax, yes. Ask for a revision of a .docx and you review the edits first; the ones you accept are written into the same file as Word tracked changes, under your name, so the next reader can accept or reject each one in Word. The file’s styles and numbering are left as they were.
If I export to Word, are the AI’s changes still tracked?
No. Exporting a Markdown document to Word gives you the accepted text, without revision marks. Tracked changes in Word come from revising a .docx you already have.