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Tips on Changing a Font Style

By Technology Last updated Sunday, July/21/2024

Use font style to change the appearance of text in documents to evoke a desired feel for the reader.happy new year image by Pavel Vlasov from Fotolia.com

Whether you are creating a word processor document, designing a Web page or simply customizing the appearance of your computer, changing the font style is a great way to give your work a custom appearance. Most word-processing programs give you a variety of options from changing the type of font, to the size and style (typically bold, underline and italic).

Word Processing

As text input is the main feature of most word processors, changing the font style of that text is an easy task. Simply highlight the text you would like to alter by left-clicking it and dragging over it, and then change the font style settings as desired. Whether you are using TextEdit or Apple iWork for the Mac, Applix Word for Linux, Wordpad or Microsoft Word for Windows, or any other text editor, these settings are almost always located on the main screen.

Two of the most typical font styles are "Arial" and "Times New Roman." These are common defaults because they are highly legible. Fonts similar in legibility, but less commonly used include "Helvetica," "Calibri" and "Verdana." To select a new font for highlighted text, simply click on the drop-down menu and click on your new choice. Most programs integrate a wide variety of fonts, so to quickly skip to the section you are looking for, type the first letter of your desired font while you have the drop-down menu open. For instance, in Microsoft Word, typing the letter "T" with the font style drop-down menu open will move you to the first alphabetical font that starts with that letter, in this case "Tahoma."

Once you have a font style chosen, it is advisable that you retain the same font throughout the body of your document to maintain a professional look. However, you may choose alterations such as making a title bold and/or larger, italicizing long quotations or underlining sections or titles of books in your references.

You can choose a default font style if you use it frequently. In Microsoft Word 2002 and 2003 for example, this is accomplished by selecting "Format" at the top of the menu bar, then clicking on the "Font" tab. Choose your desired default font, click "Default" at the bottom left of the dialog box, and then click "Yes" to confirm. In Microsoft Word 2007 and 2010, simply select the font you would like with the "Home" tab open, select "Changing Styles" on the right side, then choose the last option "Set as Default."

Blogs and email websites and programs typically have simplistic text style options very similar to word processors integrated in the main screen when working on a new composition.

Modern "what-you-see-is-what-you-get" (WYSIWYG) Web page design programs, such as Adobe Dreamweaver and Microsoft Frontpage, also use simple drop-down menus to change font style. However, if you would like to "hard code," a font preference then use the following code: <font face=""> inserting the font name inside quotes, and end that font selection with </font>.