LinkedIn text formatter for bold, italic and lists in posts, with the cost of styled text for screen readers, search and your character count stated plainly.

How to use the LinkedIn text formatter

The LinkedIn text formatter above is a free tool that turns selected words into bold, italics, monospace, underlined or struck-through text, and turns lines into bullet or numbered lists. You copy the result and paste it into a LinkedIn post, where it keeps its look.

1. Write the post as plain text

   Write or paste the whole post first. Formatting is the last step, not the first.

2. Select the words to emphasize

   Highlight one phrase. With nothing selected, a style applies to the whole text.

3. Click a style

   Click Bold, Italic or another style. Click it again on the same words to remove it, or use Ctrl+B and Ctrl+I in the text box.

4. Check the preview and the counts

   The preview shows the result, and the counts show how many characters are styled.

5. Copy and paste into LinkedIn

   Click Copy text, open Start a post on LinkedIn, and paste.

How LinkedIn text formatting works

LinkedIn posts have no bold or italic button. LinkedIn Help's article on posting lists the options in the post composer, such as emoji, media, events, polls and documents, and text formatting is not among them. So every LinkedIn formatter, this one included, uses a workaround.

The workaround is Unicode. The Mathematical Alphanumeric Symbols block contains letters that look bold, italic or monospace. A formatter swaps each ordinary letter for its styled twin, and because they are characters rather than formatting, they survive being pasted into a post.

LinkedIn font generator or text formatter: why only four styles

Many tools call themselves a LinkedIn font generator and offer twenty or more fonts: script, Fraktur, outlined letters, bubbles. They all come from the same Unicode trick, and the more decorative the alphabet, the harder it is to read and the less likely a screen reader copes with it.

This formatter keeps four letter styles that still read like text: bold, italics, bold italic and monospace. That is enough to make one line stand out in your content, and few enough that a post does not look like a ransom note. Underline, strikethrough and lists cover the rest of what people format.

LinkedIn articles have real formatting; posts do not

If you are writing a LinkedIn article or a newsletter edition, you do not need a formatter. LinkedIn Help's article on writing and publishing articles says you can change the style, bold or italicize text, add ordered or unordered lists, add blockquotes, or add a divider.

That is real formatting, which screen readers and search handle as ordinary text. Use the formatter for posts, where no such editor exists, and use the article editor for anything long. Our LinkedIn newsletter guide covers the publishing side.

What styled text does to screen readers

This is the cost most formatters leave out. Unicode Technical Report 25, which describes the mathematical letters, says they are intended for use only in mathematical or technical notation, and not for use in non-technical text.

Screen readers follow that intent. Scope, the UK disability charity, explains that Unicode characters used for effect are inaccessible to screen reader users, who may hear them skipped or read as something irrelevant, even when the characters look like standard text.

• Keep sentences plain. Style two or three words, never a whole paragraph.
• Never style the only copy of a key fact. A date, a price or a name in styled letters may not reach every reader.
• Prefer lists and line breaks. Structure made from line breaks and bullets reads well for everyone.

Styled text, search and keywords

A styled letter is a different character from the ordinary one. A bold A and a plain A share a look, not a code. LinkedIn does not document whether its search treats them as the same letter, and software that searches for a word may not match its styled version.

So keep keywords plain. The words a buyer would search for, your product category, your name and your company, belong in ordinary text. Our LinkedIn SEO guide covers where those words matter most.

How styled text affects the character count

A styled letter looks like one character, and the counter above counts it as one. Stored as code units, most of them take two, because the mathematical letters sit outside the basic range of Unicode. The formatter shows both numbers.

LinkedIn does not document which count its 3,000 character post limit uses. If a styled post is close to the limit, paste it into our LinkedIn character counter, which warns when the stricter count goes over.

What the formatter cannot style

The mathematical alphabets cover the plain Latin letters A to Z, a to z, and for some styles the digits 0 to 9. Everything else stays as it is: accented letters such as é or ü, other alphabets, punctuation and emoji. A styled word with an accent will show one plain letter in the middle.

Some fonts on some devices do not include the mathematical letters at all, and show empty boxes or plain letters instead. Check the post on your phone after you publish it.

Where to use formatted text on LinkedIn

Our LinkedIn headline examples show why plain wording does more work in a headline than any styling.

Bullet lists, numbered lists and line breaks

The most useful formatting in a LinkedIn post is not bold at all. It is a short list and white space. Bullets and numbers are ordinary characters, so they read cleanly everywhere, and a list turns a paragraph into something a reader can scan in seconds.

The formatter's list buttons work on whole lines: select the lines, click Bullet list or Numbered list, and click again to remove them. Empty lines stay empty, so your spacing survives. For more on structure, see our LinkedIn posting best practices.

Formatting posts when you sell on LinkedIn

For a seller, formatting has one job: help a busy buyer find the point. One bold line that states the takeaway, a short list of three items, and plain text for everything else. A post that looks designed reads as marketing, and buyers skim past marketing.

Put the effort into the opening line instead. It is what shows before anyone expands the post, and no style makes a weak opening strong. Our LinkedIn content strategy guide covers what to post in the first place.

Common LinkedIn formatting mistakes

• Styling whole paragraphs, which screen readers may skip or misread.
• Putting a keyword, a name or a date only in styled letters.
• Using the formatter for an article, where LinkedIn has real formatting.
• Mixing bold, italic, underline and monospace in one post.
• Styling the headline or a connection note.
• Forgetting that styled letters take more code units near the 3,000 limit.
• Not checking the post on a phone, where some fonts show boxes.

A post structure that needs almost no formatting

The structure below was written for this page. It uses one bold line, one short list and plain text everywhere else, which is about as much formatting as a LinkedIn post needs. Write it plain, then bold the takeaway line in the formatter.

{{openingLineThatStatesTheProblem}}

{{twoSentencesOfContext}}

{{takeawayLineToMakeBold}}

1. {{firstPoint}}
2. {{secondPoint}}
3. {{thirdPoint}}

{{oneQuestionForReaders}}

Frequently asked questions