Format text in a Visio drawing
Applies ToVisio Plan 2 Visio in Microsoft 365 Visio Plan 1 Visio Professional 2024 Visio Standard 2024 Visio Professional 2021 Visio Standard 2021 Visio Professional 2019 Visio Standard 2019 Visio Professional 2016 Visio Standard 2016

Use these procedures to set text formatting in a shape, text box, or on the drawing page.

Format text in one shape

  1. Double-click the text you want to edit.

  2. With the text tool I-beam pointer, do one of the following:

    • Click in text that you want to format. This applies any format changes to the entire block of text that you clicked in.

    • Highlight the specific sections of text that you want to format. This applies format changes only to the text that you highlighted.

  3. Use the text format commands on the Home tab, in the Font group or the Paragraph group. To see more options and advanced options, click the dialog box launcher Dialog Box Launcher to open the Text dialog box.

  4. Click a blank area on the page or press Esc to finish.

Format all the text in multiple shapes

You can select multiple shapes and then format all the text in all of them.

  • To format specific shapes, first select the shapes by pressing and holding CTRL while you click them.

  • To format all shapes, press CTRL+A to select them all.

After you have selected the shapes you want, use the commands (on the Home tab) in the Font group or the Paragraph group to adjust the text. When you are done, press ESC or click a blank area on the page.

Apply a text format to all uses of a shape

If you want a certain shape to have the same text formatting each time that you use it, it might be easiest to create a Master Shape.

  1. Create a shape on the page and apply the text formatting that you want that shape to have each time.

  2. Open a new stencil, your Favorites stencil, or a custom stencil that you created.

    • To open a new stencil, in the Shapes window, point to More Shapes, and then click New Stencil.

    • To open a custom stencil, in the Shapes window, point to More Shapes, click My Shapes, and then click the name of the stencil that you want.

      If the stencil is not editable, right-click the stencil title bar, and then click Edit Stencil. The icon in the stencil title bar changes to an asterisk (*), indicating that the stencil is editable.

  3. Right-click the stencil window and then click New Master.

  4. Using the Pointer Tool, drag the shape that you want to reuse to the stencil window, to create a master shape.

  5. If you want to make more changes to the new master shape, in the stencil window, right-click the master shape, click Edit Master, and then click Edit Master Shape.

To use the new master shape, drag it from the stencil window onto your drawing. You can edit the text as needed, and the text will have the same formatting.

See Also

Add, edit, move, or rotate text in Visio

Need more help?

Want more options?

Explore subscription benefits, browse training courses, learn how to secure your device, and more.