Dec 04, 2015 If the font color settings are grayed out, then you will need to change the message format to HTML or Rich Text from the Format Text tab in the message window. Open the message in Outlook 2013 for which you wish to change the font color.
UPDATE.I've tried all the suggestions. But still can't get Outlook to display bold!
UPDATE 2. See my solution below
I'm creating a HTML email newsletter. The
<h1> is bold, but when I test in Outlook (2007, 2010, 2013 etc) the font doesn't appear to be bold. Either Outlook is applying a faux bold (fattening) to the regular weight, or ignoring the bold. Whereas all other email clients use the true bold weight of the typeface.Is there anything I can do? Surely a heading
<h1> should be bold by default, without having to write css or put a <strong> or <b> around it?Here's my code (which gets inlined):
Perhaps I need to put Arial Bold in quote marks?
Here are two images. Top is how it should look. Bottom is the Outlook.
Markeee
MarkeeeMarkeee
5 Answers
Unfortunately there's not a great, reliable way to do this with Arial Bold in the mix.
Arial Bold is not installed on every system, so a font stack of
font-family:Arial Bold, Arial, sans-serif; will skip over Arial Bold and use Arial instead. Even if you download a copy of Arial Bold and send it in as a web font, Outlook doesn't support web fonts.So on systems that don't have Arial Bold installed, we're stuck with regular Arial. We can faux bold Arial:
This might be ok, but having Arial Bold in the font stack is still a bit of a wild card. On systems that do have Arial Bold installed, we'll see Arial Bold rendered... and faux-bold'd.
I'm not sure what's best for your project, but if it were me, I'd remove Arial Bold from the font stack and just faux bold regular Arial. Every system has Arial, so it's more predictable.
Ted GoasTed Goas
FireflyFirefly
You can try this markup as well:
<h1><b>CASE STUDY</b></h1>Bálint BudavölgyiBálint Budavölgyi
As @Ted Goas points out, Arial Bold is not a web safe font. In the past it was not part of IOS either. My suggestion is to use Arial with a
font-weight: 800;. It's not quite the same as Arial Bold, but it's a decent fallback.If it's a problem you only notice in Outlook and want to preserve the Arial Bold as a font for other clients, create an Outlook-only style sheet below your existing style sheet at the end of <
<head>:You can do this to fine-tune any issues you find with styles regarding Outlook.
Good luck.
gwallygwally
The problem is with versions of Outlook that use Microsoft Word to display the email. I beleive that these versions of Outlook / Word are not sophisticated enough to use the true bold cut of the typeface. Rather they use a fake / faux bold – simply fattening the letters of the regular weight. This is why they appear different, 'lighter' and uglier than the true bold cut of typefaces.
The same with italic. Older versions of Outlook / Word simply slant the regular roman version of the font - they don't use the italic cut of the font (that some poor typographer has spent months or years designing).
MarkeeeMarkeee
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In Outlook, the default font is 11-point Calibri in black. It's used when you compose new email messages. You can change the default font and its color, size, and style — such as bold or italic.
Outlook allows you to change the font, color, size, and style for new messages and replies and forwards independently. If you want to change the font used in the message list, see Create, change, or customize a view.
Change the default font, color, style, and size for messages
- On the File tab, choose Options > Mail.Note: If you have Outlook 2007, choose the Tools menu, then choose Options > Mail Format.
- Under Compose messages, choose Stationery and Fonts.
- On the Personal Stationery tab, under New mail messages or Replying or forwarding messages, choose Font.
- In the Font box, choose the font, style, size, and color that you want to use. You can see a preview of your changes as you make them.
- Choose OK three times to return to Outlook.
Your new settings will take effect immediately.
Notes:
- You have to set your font preferences independently for both new messages and replies and forwards.
- If the font that you choose isn't installed on the recipient's computer, then the recipient's mail program substitutes an available font.
Restore the initial default font style options
If you later decide you don't want to keep your custom font settings and want to return to the default settings, you can use the above steps, but choose the following values.
