You can format a YouTube comment with a few characters typed before and after your text. Use asterisks for bold, underscores for italics, and hyphens for strikethrough. The formatting appears after you post the comment or reply.
These markers work when you write a comment on YouTube from a desktop browser, iPhone, or Android device. Keep the opening and closing marker directly next to the text you want to format.
Video Tutorial
Write bold text in YouTube comments
Put an asterisk at the start and end of the word or phrase. An asterisk is the * character.
- Start writing a YouTube comment or reply.
- Type an asterisk before the text you want to make bold.
- Type another asterisk immediately after that text.
- Post the comment.
For example, type *This text is bold* in the comment box. Once posted, YouTube displays the words between the asterisks in bold. The asterisks themselves do not appear in the published comment.
You can make a single word bold or use the same method for a longer phrase. Just make sure you include both markers.
Write italic text in YouTube comments
To italicize text, surround it with underscores. An underscore is the _ character.
- Open the YouTube comment or reply field.
- Type an underscore before your text.
- Type your word or phrase.
- Add a second underscore at the end, then post the comment.
For example, enter _This text is italic_. After you post it, YouTube displays that text in italics.
Use italics when you want to add a little emphasis without making the text as prominent as bold text. As with bold formatting, keep the underscores immediately before and after the section you want changed.
Add strikethrough text to a YouTube comment
Strikethrough places a line through your text. On YouTube, type a hyphen before and after the text you want to cross out.
- Begin a new comment or reply on YouTube.
- Type a hyphen before the text.
- Enter the text you want to show with a line through it.
- Type another hyphen at the end and post your comment.
For example, type -This text has a line through it-. YouTube converts the text between the hyphens to strikethrough when the comment is published.
This is useful for corrections, jokes, or showing a change of mind in a reply. Check that you used a hyphen at both ends, since a missing closing marker prevents the formatting from working as expected.
Use more than one formatting style
You can use bold, italics, and strikethrough in the same YouTube comment or reply. Add the matching marker pair around each part you want to format, then post the comment to check the result.
For example, you might make one key phrase bold, use italics for another phrase, and put a correction in strikethrough. This keeps longer comments easier to scan without formatting every word.
When you combine styles, keep each pair of markers with the text it belongs to. Preview the text in the comment field before posting so you can spot a missing asterisk, underscore, or hyphen.
Paste a different font into a YouTube comment
You can also post text that uses a different font style. The video demonstrates the free tool TextTrick.com for this.
- Open TextTrick.com.
- Type the text you want to use.
- Scroll down to view the available font styles.
- Select a style you like. The text is copied.
- Return to YouTube and paste the copied text into your comment or reply.
- Post the comment.
The pasted text appears in the selected font style on YouTube. This is separate from YouTube’s bold, italic, and strikethrough markers, so use the method that best fits the part of your comment you want to emphasize.
Quick formatting reference
Use asterisks around text for bold, underscores around text for italics, and hyphens around text for strikethrough. Type the markers first, add your text between them, and post the comment to see the formatted result.
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