A Foot Switch for Copy and Paste
The Pedal Three ($69) is three ribbed foot pedals on a curved steel base with a captive USB cable, and copy and paste is one of the first things people want to put on it. It can be done. Whether it should be is the fairer question, and we get to that below, but first the practical check that decides everything else.
Can a foot switch send a copy shortcut at all?
Only if it can send combinations. Copy and paste are a modifier plus a letter on every desktop system, so a switch limited to one plain key cannot produce them, and plenty of cheap switches are limited to exactly that. This is the single thing to confirm on a listing before you pay, and it is not always stated plainly: look for wording about modifiers, combinations or multi-key sequences rather than assuming.
Where a pedal does support combinations, the setup is unremarkable. You program it once with the supplied utility, it holds the setting itself, and afterwards it sends that combination into whichever window has focus. Nothing runs in the background and there is nothing to configure per application.
Which pedal should get which action?
With three, the usual arrangement is copy on the left, paste on the right, and something you use less often in the middle, because the middle pedal is the hardest to find blind. Keep copy and paste apart rather than adjacent. They get used in quick succession, and neighbouring pedals are how you end up pasting over the thing you meant to copy.
The Pedal Four ($85) is a wide flat metal plate with four pedals in a row and more space between them, which is worth the difference if you work in socks or want to find the outer pedals without looking down.
Is copy and paste a good use of a foot?
Often it is not, and we would rather say so here. Copying almost always follows a selection you have just made with a hand, so the hand is already in place and the shortcut costs nothing. The pedal saves a movement you were not making. Feet are best at things you hold, and at things you repeat with no selection beforehand.
There is a real exception. Pasting the same clipboard contents over and over into a form, a spreadsheet or a run of fields, where your hands are busy navigating and the paste is the only constant, is a genuinely good pedal binding. If that is your day, put paste under a foot and it will earn its keep. If it is not, hold to talk is the binding that changes more.
What about paste without formatting, or a clipboard manager?
Both work, and both are simply longer combinations. Paste without formatting is usually one extra modifier, so the same rule applies: the pedal has to be able to send it. A clipboard manager with a shortcut of its own is arguably a better pedal binding than plain paste, because it opens a list you then choose from with your hands, which puts the foot on the repetitive part and the hand on the part needing judgement.
Which one should I buy?
Three pedals at $69 if copy, paste and one more is the whole ask. Four at $85 if spacing matters to you more than a compact base does. Either way, put the least reversible action on the pedal furthest from your resting foot, and do not bind anything you would regret triggering by accident.
If you are still working out what a foot switch is for in general, start with what does a foot pedal do on a keyboard.