How to emphasize key words in your text
What works, what doesn’t, and why.
Okay, full disclosure: I read, write, and edit for a living. So, I guess I’m something of a writing geek. And this entire piece is all about one tiny aspect of writing: namely how best to use typography to show emphasis in a piece of text. If the thought of reading such a topic makes you want to run a mile, I suggest you, well, go run a mile. Or at least go read something else.
However, for anyone who is still reading, I will point out that my interest in this (as with all writing-related topics) is rooted in my broader interest in effective communication. That is, I don’t care for writing rules in and of themselves, but I do value anything that helps us communicate more clearly with one another.
Why we emphasize sections of text
In text-based documents, sometimes there’s a key word or phrase that you really want people to sit up and notice. So what do we do? We differentiate that word or phrase in some visual manner using typography in order to make it stand out from the rest of the text around it. Simple.
However, when it comes to adding emphasis to text, many people seem unsure quite how to do it. I regularly see all manner of techniques used. In fact, it’s not uncommon to see people using several different techniques within the same document.
Before we look at the different styles that can be used to emphasize text, it’s worth pausing and remembering that there are many other factors that can help you to communicate your point effectively. For example, paying attention to sentence structure, order, and length, and to your choice of words and punctuation will all greatly help.
Okay, but having said all that, there will still be times when you do want to add emphasis to a particular word or phrase within your text. In such cases, what should you do?
Two good techniques
Use italics
Turns out that throwing petrol on a bonfire is a really bad idea.
These days italics is the most widely used method of adding emphasis to text. It is simple, elegant, and widely understood.
Note: If a whole passage of text is already rendered in italics (such as a block quote) then you can emphasize a key word or phrase within it by rendering it as standard Roman (i.e. non-italicized) text.
Use bold
In English language publishing, italics is the most widely used technique for adding emphasis. However, using bold is a valid alternative, used by some publishers and websites:
Turns out that throwing petrol on a bonfire is a really bad idea.
So, the guidance really is simple: if you want to emphasize some text, use italics or bold. (But, please, don’t combine the two; there’s really no need.)
In fact, I’ve noticed that some modern writing applications (including Medium) now only offer bold and italics as text formatting options. Good on them, I say!
Techniques best avoided
Don’t underline
Back in time, when people predominantly wrote by hand, or used mechanical typewriters, underlining a key word or phrase was the easiest way to indicate emphasis:
However, with the advent of word processors, and then personal computers, other formatting options became available, and using italics and bold soon became the norm. Then, when the internet came along, a convention quickly emerged to highlight hyperlinks within text by underlining them. Although not all sites underline links today, a strong association between the two still exists, so it’s generally a bad idea to manually underline text that isn’t a link.
Don’t use all caps
Turns out that throwing petrol on a bonfire is a REALLY bad idea.
Yes, the reader picks up on the emphasis, but it all seems kind of shouty, doesn’t it?
This is perhaps not surprising, as one of the standard uses for presenting parts of text in uppercase is precisely to indicate (when writing direct speech, such as in a novel or screenplay) that someone is shouting:
As he walked towards the door she shouted, “JOHN, NO!”
The other common use of uppercase text you will have come across is in legal documents, such as software license agreements, where certain terms and phrases are rendered in uppercase. I don’t really know the rationale behind this one, but it does act as a useful visual cue to us all to immediately skip the text and quickly click whatever button will make the horrible legal speak go away. Probably not an association you want when aiming to draw your reader’s attention to a key word.
Don’t arbitrarily capitalize words
Turns out that throwing petrol on a bonfire is a Really Bad Idea.
Again, I get the intent here. People are wanting to mimic in text the kind of stress and intonation used when emphasizing something in speech.
But here’s the thing: This is exactly what italic formatting is for.
Turns out that throwing petrol on a bonfire is a really bad idea.
Or, if you prefer:
Turns out that throwing petrol on a bonfire is a really bad idea.
Also, using an initial capital letter mid-sentence is how we denote proper nouns — that is, names of people, places, products, or organizations:
The book belonged to Fifi. She had bought it at Folix book shop in Frimpton.
This reserving-of-an-initial-capital-letter-for-proper-nouns distinction is dead useful. It means that even if we’ve never heard of “Fifi”, “Folix”, or “Frimpton”, we immediately understand that these words are proper nouns, and therefore, in this context, likely refer to a person, a shop, and a place.
It’s so much clearer for all if we use italics (or bold) to show emphasis, and reserve capital letters for their intended roles, such as indicating the start of a sentence or flagging up a proper noun. It only makes things more confusing when people try to take one typographical effect and use if for a different purpose.
Don’t use lots of exclamation marks
In any kind of formal writing, avoid littering your text with exclamation marks.
It just makes things look a bit hyper! Truly! And overly excited! Like a teenage cheerleaders’ convention! Probably not the effect you are hoping to achieve!
Don’t use other random techniques
(Different font color, font size, letter spacing, etc.)
In more visual mediums, such as adverts, posters, book covers, etc., the use of different font styles, sizes, colors, and spacings can all be used to great effect. But when it comes to text-based documents, avoid using such non-standard visual cues to emphasize particular words or phrases. Again, there’s really no need.
So there you have it: If you really need to emphasize something in your text, use italics or bold. And remember, if everything is emphasized, then nothing is emphasized. So be restrained with your use of emphasis, as the more you use it, the less impact it will have.
Note that I tried to keep things brief for this article, but as with most topics, there is so much more that could be said about each aspect of what is covered here. If you are hungry for more, you’ll find many more detailed articles and style guides online.
If you enjoyed reading this, you may also be interested to read some of my other pieces, for example:
