If you press and hold until the first word of the bunch is selected, you can then slide your finger very quickly to the last word of the bunch as long as you’ve kept it pressed down. No need to fiddle with those annoying blue bar things. It’s all done with one press and slide. Nifty.

It doesn’t work with text you’re currently editing though. In that case, I do a double-tap to select the first word then drag the blue bar (or yellow in Notes) to where I want it. If you want to select a portion of a Note that you’re currently editing, it might be better to tap ‘Done’ at top right before doing a selection because that will allow you to do the method I mentioned first and it also vacates the keyboard allowing you to see more of the text.

Also, while editing a Note, a very quick triple-tap will select a paragraph. This doesn’t seem to work in web browser html text mind you (though it does in browsers’ text entry fields).

Someone else might know a better way. I’m not very nerdy about text on iOS.

nitinkhanna.10centuries.org.