How do I emphasize or style text?

To make text bold, select it and press ⌘ + B, or wrap it in **double asterisks.** On iOS/iPadOS, you can press the B button on the keyboard toolbar.

To create italics, press I (iOS/iPadOS), press ⌘ + I, or wrap the text in *single asterisks.*

To underline, press U, ⌘ + U, or wrap in _underscores_.

For bold italics, just wrap the text in ***triple asterisks.***

On iOS/iPadOS, If you have a keyboard attached, the macOS keyboard shortcuts work as well:

  • ⌘B for Bold
  • ⌘I for Italics
  • ⌘U for Underline

_*Don't hesitate* to mix and match **emphasis!**_

Emphasis doesn't work across line breaks, so these two lines won't be bold:

**AMITY ISLAND
WELCOMES YOU**

You have to emphasize each line separately:

**AMITY ISLAND**
**WELCOMES YOU**

Emphasis characters need to be alongside the emphasized text. The following does not display as italics:

The sign reads:* Beach Closed.*

To fix it, move the asterisk:

The sign reads: *Beach Closed.*

Uppercase

To convert text to UPPERCASE, select it and press the Cc button, or press ⌘K on your keyboard. Repeat this to cycle the selected text through UPPERCASE, lowercase, and sentence case.

When no text is selected, the Uppercase button/menu item will act on the current line.

Stu MaschwitzmacOS, iOS/iPadOS, formatting