You can send someone a link that opens a web page at the exact sentence you want them to read. Their browser usually scrolls to the words and highlights them, even if the site's owner never added a link to that spot.
Current versions of Chrome, Edge, Safari and Firefox can open these links. Browsers call them text fragments. Google Search uses the same feature for some of its highlighted answers, so you may already have followed one without noticing.
Copy a link to the words
In desktop Chrome, select a sentence and right-click it. Choose Copy link to highlight, then paste the result into your message. Firefox has its own Copy Link to Highlight command, added in Firefox 145.
Making a link and opening it are different features, so the menu wording and availability can vary by browser. You can test the copied link in a fresh tab before sending it. The recipient still needs access to the page, so a highlighted link won't get them through a login or a paywall.
Chrome's instructions for sharing highlighted text, Firefox's Copy Link to Highlight release note
The sentence travels in the link
A simple link adds #:~:text= followed by the words to find. A space becomes %20. You can write one yourself, though the browser's copy command saves you from getting the punctuation wrong.
A link ending in #:~:text=the%20exact%20words asks the browser to find "the exact words" on that page. Matching ignores capital letters. If the phrase appears twice, the link can include nearby words to pick the right occurrence.
https://example.com/long-page#:~:text=the%20exact%20words
https://example.com/long-page#:~:text=first%20few%20words,last%20few%20words
https://example.com/long-page#:~:text=right%20before-,the%20words%20you%20wantA starting phrase and an ending phrase can mark a longer passage. One link can also contain several highlights. Those options are useful when a short quote alone would lose its context, but a copied link can become long enough to look awkward in a message.
An edit can break the highlight
If the site rewrites the selected words, the browser may no longer find them and will open the page without that highlight. If the link also includes a heading link, as in #setup:~:text=the%20exact%20words, the browser can fall back to that section. A normal link to a heading can last longer, provided the site keeps that heading's address. For something you want to cite for years, check whether that option exists.
The feature has privacy limits too. Browsers restrict these jumps to stop other sites from using them to probe private pages. Chrome and Edge also let a site opt out and force visitors to land at the top.
Your shared link contains the selected words. Don't treat that link as a private way to quote a confidential document. For an ordinary public page, though, it saves the other person from hunting through paragraphs to find the line you meant.
