Do you want to change the font size in your WordPress posts or pages?
Sometimes, you may want to make a line or a paragraph larger, or you might want to increase the font size of your entire page content.
In this article, we’ll show you how to easily change the font size in WordPress. You’ll learn not only how to change font size in your WordPress posts, but also how to do it across your website.
Video Tutorial
If you’d prefer written instructions, just keep reading.
Method 1: Using Paragraph Headings
It takes your visitors just a couple of seconds to decide whether they want to stay or leave your website. This gives you very little time to convince them to stay on your website.
Using Headings in your content is a great way to grab user attention.
They allow you to break your posts and pages into sections using different headings (often called “subheadings”).
Headings are great for SEO as well. Search engines give proper headings more weight than normal paragraph text.
How to add a heading in the default WordPress block editor
You can add a heading to your posts or pages by simply adding the ‘Heading’ block. You can search for it or find it in the ‘Common Blocks’ section in the WordPress block editor.
The block will default to Heading 2. Normally, it makes sense to stick with Heading 2 for your subheadings. If you want to change this, then you can simply click on the ‘H2’ drop-down to select a different size.
Alternatively, you can change this in the block settings on the right-hand side of the screen. You can also change the heading’s color there as well.
How to add a heading in the older Classic Editor
If you are still using the older classic editor in WordPress, then you can add headings using the ‘Paragraph’ drop-down.
Just highlight the text that you want to turn into a heading, click the ‘Paragraph’ drop-down, and select your heading size.
The sizes and colors of the different Heading styles are controlled by your theme’s stylesheet (style.css).
If you’re using a premium WordPress theme, then you may have the option to change these settings under Appearance » Customize.
Using subheadings in your articles makes it easier for readers to follow what you’re telling them. At the same time, it also makes your WordPress posts SEO friendly.
Method 2: Changing the Size of the Text in the Block Editor
What if you want to have a paragraph or even your whole post in a larger font? You can do this really easily using the default WordPress block editor.
Just click on any paragraph block, then select the font size under ‘Text Settings’ on the right-hand side.
You can select from the drop-down, which covers Small, Normal, Medium, Large, and Huge. If you change your mind, then just click the ‘Reset’ button to set your paragraph back to the default text.
There’s also a ‘Custom’ option where you can simply type in the pixel size that you’d like. If you want, you can also set a large Drop Cap to appear at the start of your paragraph.
These options aren’t available in the older classic editor for WordPress. If you want to use them, then think about making the switch. Our tutorial on how to use the new WordPress block editor will help you.
If you are determined to stick with the classic editor, then this next option is for you.
Method 3: Change Font Size Using The TinyMCE Advanced Plugin
TinyMCE Advanced is a WordPress plugin that gives you more control over font sizes and text formatting, as well as a range of other features.
This is particularly useful with the older classic editor, but it also works with the block editor. It adds a new block called “Classic Paragraph” that has all the TinyMCE controls.
To use it, you’ll first need to install and activate the TinyMCE Advanced plugin. If you’re not sure how to do that, check out our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Next, go to Settings » TinyMCE Advanced to configure the editor settings. This is where you can set up the buttons you want to use in the TinyMCE Advanced toolbar.
If you’re using it with the Classic editor, then you should see that TinyMCE has the ‘Font Size’ drop-down enabled by default in the second row of icons.
You can move it to the first row by dragging it upwards if you want.
If you’re using the block editor, then you’ll need to scroll down the screen and add the Font Sizes drop-down to the toolbar by dragging and dropping it:
Make sure you click ‘Save Changes’ at the bottom of the screen.
To see the button in action, create a new post or edit an existing one.
In the block editor, you’ll now have the option to add a ‘Classic Paragraph’ block. It will have the TinyMCE Advanced controls, like this:
In the classic editor, you’ll see the TinyMCE Advanced toolbars with a font size drop-down:
You can select any font size from the drop-down.
Note: this doesn’t give you as many options as the WordPress block editor, and you can’t type in your own font size.
Method 4: Change Site-Wide Font Size Using CSS
If you are changing font sizes every time you edit a post, then you may want to make it easier by changing it permanently in your theme.
The good news is that you can change the default paragraph size across your whole site. The best way to do this is by using the Theme Customizer under Appearance » Customize.
Some WordPress themes may come with an option for you to change the font size. If you can find this option, then you can use it without writing CSS code.
However, if your theme does not have that feature, then you can add custom CSS to add your own font size rules.
Simply click on the ‘Additional CSS’ option in the theme customizer. This is where you can store all your custom CSS code.
Now under the additional CSS text box, simply add your CSS code. In this example, we are changing the font size to ’16px’, you can choose a different font size.
p {
font-size:16px;
}
You’ll immediately see the changes on the preview on the right-hand side of the screen. If you’re happy with the font size, click the ‘Publish’ button at the top of your screen to make it live.
Note: Your custom CSS will only be applied to the theme you’re using. If you later choose to switch to a different WordPress theme, you’ll need to copy and paste it into the Customizer again.
The above code only applies to paragraph text. What if you wanted to change the font size of all h2 sub-headings?
Simply modify the above code to target the h2 element in your theme like this:
h2 {
font-size:32px;
}
You can do the same thing with other headings as well by simply changing h2 to h3, h4, or h5.
We hope this article helped you learn how to easily change the font size in WordPress. You may also want to see our guide on how to use custom fonts in WordPress or our list of the best drag & drop WordPress page builder plugins.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
Thank you. Your explanation is clear. But, I cannot apply it to my editing activities. In my Block Editor and Classic Editor, there is no font size dropdown menu. It’s frustating. Can you help me?
Hi there,
thanks for this tutorial. I was trying to do the fourth method and wanted to change my H2 size. I copy and pasted the code into my custom CSS but when I change the px value nothing happens. The Size doesn’t change. Very annoying :O
You may need to check with your theme’s support in case they are overriding your CSS
Pls which google front wpbeginner is using
For the moment, we are using the Proxima Nova font.
Thanks for the help!
You’re welcome!
In the new wordpress block editor, regardless of whether I give it a H1 or H4 heading, it doesn’t change the size of the font at all. Sure, in the editor the size changes, but when I publish, there is no size change for what the public sees.
Your theme may have styling for your headings that make the text look the same. You would either want to edit it with CSS or reach out to your theme’s support.
Well thanks for this valuable information.
You’re welcome
Hi, is there a way to set/change defaults with the Classic paragraph editor? So for example if you wanted each block of text to have size 14 in Book Antiqua, is there a way to keep as a preset instead of having to manually change every block or even line?
For what you’re wanting, you would likely need to use the CSS method from this article to set the text how you’re wanting.
Hi there,
I have the tiny mce advanced plugin. I added the font size to the selection but when i go to my pages, but doesn’t appear and I’ve clicked through all the options and don’t see where else to add it.
You will likely need to reach out to your specific theme’s support and they should be able to assist with what could be preventing the changes.
Hello. Thanks for the posting. I have one question. If I want to enlarge a couple of words in one block, how can I do it?
You would likely need to edit the paragraph using HTML to manually add the text changes to specific sections.
I see. I was hoping that there were other options to do so. I will give it a try. Thank you!
Thanks for this article. It is very useful and every point is understandable.
Glad you found the article helpful
Thank you so much for this! I was afraid I’d have to buy a premium theme to make such small changes. This helped tons!
Glad our guide was helpful
This was so helpful! The font on my site was so small. Quick question, is there a way to do this for lists in the block editor? I noticed they are still the same size after adding the code to my css editor.
You would want to use inspect element to target the text in your lists. We have a guide on how to use it below:
https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/basics-of-inspect-element-with-your-wordpress-site
Useful Information
Thank you
Thank you for this post. I use astra theme and have implemented the custom css method for paragraph.
Thank you again
Glad our post was able to help you
Thanks for being a reliable source of factual information pertaining to wordpress.
Would appreciate an easy way to change light grey fonts to a more easily readable black.
For that, you would normally use CSS to change the color. For how to find the CSS to change you would want to take a look at our article below on using inspect element:
https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/basics-of-inspect-element-with-your-wordpress-site/
thank you ..
it was very useful informations
You’re welcome
How can I increase the font size of my blog tittle?
You would use similar CSS to this but to target your blog title you would want to use inspect element which we have a guide on how to use here:
https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/basics-of-inspect-element-with-your-wordpress-site/
Thank you so much!
This site has saved my life numerous times. thank you.
You’re welcome, glad our guides have been helpful to you
Nice video, but I was looking for a way to decrease the size of the font in my post title. Any resources you could direct me to?
Thank you.
You would normally need to use the CSS method for that and for finding what CSS is needed, you would want to take a look at our guide on inspect element here:
https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/basics-of-inspect-element-with-your-wordpress-site/
I was actually looking for something like TINY MCE, thanks for the help.
You are doing a great job, keep it up!
Glad our recommendations could help
Hi, I want to change the default wordpress font size. I tried to add it in additional css. But it did not work. Please suggest me what to do. Thanks
Your theme may be overriding the style you’re adding. You either check with your theme’s support or use inspect element to see what CSS you need to set for the font size: https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/basics-of-inspect-element-with-your-wordpress-site/
I want to add a tiny text at the right size of image like a source link refer to image from…
Help me how can I do this?
For an image credit, you would want to take a look at our article here: https://www.wpbeginner.com/beginners-guide/how-to-add-image-credits-in-wordpress-step-by-step/
Hey,
I was confused about the size of font. What is the size of font you are using in wpbeginner
Either way, Your articles are best keep it up!
Cheers,
Habib
For the moment it is 16px, for finding out information like this on sites you may want to take a look at our inspect element guide here: https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/basics-of-inspect-element-with-your-wordpress-site/
Hello!
I tried to change the font sizes (body+headings) in CSS but wasn’t successful;
Something went wrong. Your change may not have been saved. Please try again. There is also a chance that you may need to manually fix and upload the file over FTP.
What should I do? Your comments would be greatly appreciated ☺️
It would depend on where you are adding the code, are you under Appearance>Customize>Additional CSS?
Want to change the font size of titles of all my posts and pages. Please help.
For finding what to target on your specific theme, you would want to take a look at our guide on using inspect element: https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/basics-of-inspect-element-with-your-wordpress-site/
With the new version of WordPress, this does not work. I am not sure why the article lists as 4/19 because some comments are a lot older.
The date updates even if we edit out typos, these methods should work with the classic editor and for the block editor, there is the option to change the font size in the paragraph’s block settings.
Simple, straight forward and easy to follow. Thank you <3
You’re welcome
My theme is Sydney The articles’ titles are too big in mobile. Is there a way to change them without coding and without plugins. I use Elementor.
If you’re using Elementor, then it should have options to change the font size in the design options for what you’re using to display the post. If you’re not customizing your layout with Elementor it would require CSS or reaching out to the theme’s support.
I want to change the site title font on my self-hosted wordpress site and cannot get a simple answer as to how to do that. can you help?
To do that, it would normally require custom CSS or a tool such as CSS Hero. You may want to take a look at: https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-themes/how-to-add-custom-fonts-in-wordpress/
In the video, at 28 seconds, the editor is shown. There are all kinds of tools in the button bar.
My dashboard doesn’t have that editor. There are, in fact, no buttons at all, just a text box with giant text in it.
So, how do I get access to a real editor like you have?
Jim
WordPress added Gutenberg/Block editor after this video was made, if you wanted to use the editor in the current video then you would use the plugin in: https://www.wpbeginner.com/plugins/how-to-disable-gutenberg-and-keep-the-classic-editor-in-wordpress/
Thank you!
I want to make text h1 but the text size should be as paragraph. Is this possible?
Hi Nroy,
Yes it is possible if you are using TinyMCE advanced plugin you can select a heading and change its font size.
What if you want to make the title smaller but the tagline bigger? Being able to dictate fonts and sizes of text in posts is great, but how about the title and tagline?
Love these tutorials. This tutorial helped my font look uniform on my website. Thanks again!
I installed this and it doesn’t show in the editor? What am I missing? Thanks.
My old WP theme appears to have coded Heading 1 in 12 pt font like normal text. I manually change each heading to 14 pt. But then the coding doesn’t say “h1” which Google robots look for. If I use your plugin(which is cool) and change heading font sizes, will they still be labeled h1, h2, h3? Also, I don’t want to change fonts on pages already customized. Can I apply the plugin to blog posts only? Thanks.
Hi Darlene,
You can give plugin a try. However, if your headings are hard coded in the theme then this may not help you change those headings.
The use of px (or pt) in this Guide is not recommendable, because on small Screens like on Smartphones the font size is very small. Its better to use em.
How do I change the font size of menu items?
hi, my fontsize is % not pt, how can i change it back to pt?
fantastic… i just did it… thank a lot
I want to enlarge Excel spreadsheets in my posts. I snip them and upload them via Add Media. But I don’t see a way to increase the font size of these uploads.
So…. I increased the font size in my spreadsheet and then snipped and uploaded the spreadsheet with the larger font – but it still appears as the original size.
Is there any way to increase the font size in the post as it currently is too small to be easily read (there are several columns in my spreadsheet)?
Hi Andrew,
We are not sure we fully understand your question. If you are uploading your spreadsheet as an image file, then its dimensions will depend on your post container. Let’s suppose your post container or content area is 600px wide, then your theme will automatically shrink the image to fit in the container. You can also try selecting full size image before inserting it into your post.
Hi, thanks for sharing, very useful indeed. Is there a way to also adjust the font size of the title, or maybe better done in CSS (and if so, how)? thanks again!
I use tinymcv plugin to change the font size. but when i press enter and go to the next line the font size will be default value which is 9pt. How can I change the default value to 12pt.
Thanks for the post. But I want to know more… I want to make the bigger size of some special word in a sentence without any plugin. Special words in a sentence. e.g. we are doing in MS word. Can it possible? Hope your answer.
Hi jitendra to do that open your text editor.
and type “font-size: 120%;”
For example:
Your text
You can change the font % by any value. I hope it will help you.
Thanks for the video and info, but I can’t change single lines of font sizes when writing a blog post.
In Visual Editor when I select “Heading 1” or “Heading 2” it changes the entire entry, but I only need to change that one line. I have to double space to make that happen without changing everything else. But then the spacing is wrong because it doesn’t need to be double spaced. Please help. And is there any other way to change font by font size (11, 12, 14, etc) instead of the preselected “Heading 1” “Heading 2”, etc.? Because TinyMCE didn’t work for me. Thanks!
What are you talking about, WordPress? Just make a simple option to increase the font size! Not widgets that don’t work with some themes or they work for one paragraph etc. Because the Paragraph tab give either too small a font, or weirdly formatted, hard to read. Why is it so hard to just add an option to increase the size wit a button?…
Not kidding. This should not be this difficult. Every time I hit return it reverts back to the original size. Do I really have to select the font size for every single paragraph?
TinyMce advance has conflict with visual composer,
Hi. Thank you. I am learning how to edit font size, font type and spacing. This is a big help.
Hi, first of all thank you for all the knowlege available on this site. It’s great !
I followed instructions from this article, but I still can’t change to font size in headers. I installed both TinyMCE and Google fonts. I am able to change font styles but not the size.
Thank you,
Anna
Thanks for this great post. It worked for me. I can now edit font family, change font size, underline text, highlight text and even insert table. Thanks.
I just updated my site and theme. I am having a weird issue of my woocommerce product titles having bigger fonts than they were before updates. i have tried custom css from other forums and wondering if maybe I can get an option here.. Kindly advise.
Hey Philip,
Have you tested your website with different browsers and devices to make sure that it is not an issue with your browser settings. After that try reaching out to your theme developer, they will be able to tell you whats changed in the new version or if there is a better way to solve this issue.
Is there a simple way to set a new default font size in WP?
I have been manually setting to a larger font to improve readability but the theme doesn’t like it and tends to revert back to default whenever I press ENTER and also the paragraph headings don’t work when I’m inside text with the new size.
I’d have thought this would have been one of the first features to include in WP themes. The current default font is very small and I find it hard to read.
Thanks, Thomas.
Hi Thomas,
You can go to Appearance » Customize and click on the Additional CSS tab.
Then in the CSS box on the left panel, add this CSS at the end of whatever text/code you see there.
body { font-size:16px; }You will see font size change in the live preview. Don’t forget to click on the ‘Save & Publish’ button on top.
This is so ridiculous and why I’m having a hard time with WP. It should be just as Word. You highlight the text and select from 100’s of fonts. Why does WP make this so difficult for the lay person? Can this not be changed?
Perfect! Thank you.
How do you change the font size of the title….I am not talking about content I mean the page title located at the very top of a page..