How the WhatsApp font generator works
WhatsApp does not let you pick a font. What you can do is send characters that look like a different font. Unicode, the standard every phone uses for text, includes complete alphabets of styled letters for mathematics: bold, italic, script, fraktur, double-struck, monospace and more. It also has circled and squared letters, small capitals, fullwidth letters and combining marks that draw a line through or under the character before them. This tool swaps each Latin letter for its styled twin, so Sale becomes 𝗦𝗮𝗹𝗲 or 𝒮𝒶𝓁ℯ. Because the result is text, not an image, it pastes anywhere.
Letters with no styled version stay as they are. Small caps has no x and the tiny style has no q, so those letters appear unchanged; Hindi, emoji and most punctuation are never converted.
How to use stylish text on Android, iPhone and WhatsApp Web
- Type or paste your text in the box above. Every style updates as you type.
- Press Copy next to the style you like. The button changes to Copied.
- Android: open the chat, press and hold inside the message box and tap Paste.
- iPhone: tap the message box once, tap it again and choose Paste.
- WhatsApp Web or desktop: click in the message box and press Ctrl+V (Cmd+V on a Mac).
- For your name or About, open WhatsApp Settings, tap your profile, then edit Name or About and paste.
Native WhatsApp formatting cheat sheet
Native formatting is the most reliable way to style a message. WhatsApp reads the markers and draws the style itself, so it works on every phone and in every language, screen readers read the words normally, and customers can still search for them later.
| Style | Type this | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Bold | *Sale today* | Sale today |
| Italic | _Sale today_ | Sale today |
| Strikethrough | ~₹999~ | |
| Monospace | ```DIWALI10``` | DIWALI10 |
| Inline code | `DIWALI10` | DIWALI10 |
| Bulleted list | - item or * item at the start of a line | A bullet point |
| Numbered list | 1. item at the start of a line | A numbered step |
| Quote | > text at the start of a line | An indented quote |
Markers must touch the text: *Sale* works, * Sale * does not. You can also select a word in the app and choose the style from the menu (the three dots on Android, Format on iPhone). Source: WhatsApp Help Center, "How to format your messages". For a long message with several styles, the WhatsApp text formatter shows a live chat preview.
Where fancy text works on WhatsApp
| Place | Unicode styles | Native *bold* markers |
|---|---|---|
| Chats and groups | Yes | Yes |
| Text status | Yes | Varies by app version; post a test first |
| Profile name | Yes | No, shown as plain asterisks |
| About | Yes | No, shown as plain asterisks |
| Group name | Yes | No, shown as plain asterisks |
| Business message templates | Avoid | Yes, in the body |
A styled first line in a festive greeting, such as 𝐇𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐲 𝐃𝐢𝐰𝐚𝐥𝐢 from Meera at Rangoli Home, is a good use. A whole paragraph in cursive is hard to read on a small screen, so keep fancy text to a few words.
Accessibility and why businesses should avoid fancy text
Unicode styles are not fonts. To a phone, 𝐒𝐚𝐥𝐞 is four mathematical symbols, not the word "Sale". Screen readers such as TalkBack and VoiceOver may spell them out one by one, announce them as symbols or skip them, so a customer who relies on one may miss your message. Search also misses them: a customer looking for "sale" in their chats will not find 𝐒𝐚𝐥𝐞. Some older phones show empty boxes instead.
For anything a business sends, from order updates to broadcast campaigns, use native formatting. It is supported in the body of a message template, while unusual characters can make a template look like spam. Write and check template-safe text in the text formatter, then add variables and buttons in the template preview tool. To let customers start a chat with one tap, create a link with the WhatsApp link generator.