Many of the applications where you need to write will have at least some basic formatting options. This might include things like different fonts or text colors, but will likely include at least the ability to bold, underline, or italicize.
Since a lot of text is composed on mobile phones, you might be wondering if you can learn how to italicize on iPhone 13.
Fortunately, this is possible in apps like Mail or Notes where you have a bit more freedom with the way that you write.
How to Italicize Text – iPhone
- Open an app where you can edit text.
- Tap on the text to italicize and select it.
- Touch the BIU button.
- Select the Italic option.
Our guide continues below with more information on how to italicize on iPhone 13, including pictures of these steps.
The iPhone has become more and more efficient at customizing and editing various types of documents and media over time. This has occurred through the use of helpful third-party apps, as well as improvements to some of the existing default apps on the device.
But the iPhone also has some settings and formatting capabilities that persist across a number of the apps on the device. This includes features like copy and paste, as well as ways that you can customize the selected text.
Perhaps the three most common text formating choices in various word processing and text editor applications are bold, underline, and italics.
The iPhone allows you to apply these formats to selected text in some of the default apps on the device, including Mail, Notes, and more.
Our guide below will show you how to apply italics to text on an iPhone.
Check out our turn off missed call text message iPhone tutorial for more information on ways that you can customize your device notifications.
How to Write in Italics on iPhone (Guide with Pictures)
The steps in this article were performed on an iPhone 13 in iOS 15.0.2. However, this will also work for most other iPhone models in most other versions of iOS.
Step 1: Open the app where you want to write.
This could be an app like Mail or Notes where you have a text editor. Note that you cannot use italics in text messages or iMessages.
Step 2: Tap on the text, then use one of the selection options until all of the text that you wish to italicize is selected.
Step 3: Tap the button with BIU on it.
Step 4: Touch the Italic button in the horizontal black bar.
The text that you selected should now be in italics.
Now that you know how to italicize on iPhone 13 you can start to use that formatting more when you are composing emails or creating notes.
Our article discusses more about iPhone italics, including the unfortunate absence of italics iMessage formatting.
More Information on How to Write in Italics on an iPhone 13
When you are applying formatting to a text selection on your iPhone, the available options are:
- Speak
- Bold
- Italic
- Underline
- Spell
If you want to remove italics from a text selection you will need to select the italic text, choose the BIU button again, then tap Italic again to restore it to normal text.
Not every app on the iPhone where you can write or edit text allows you to italicize. For example, if you want to know how to do italics on an iPhone text message then you won’t be able to do so. While there are things you can do when you select text in a text message, including:
- Cut
- Copy
- Paste
- Replace
- Look Up
- Translate
- Speak
- Share
- Spell
You aren’t able to italicize text messages on an iPhone or make them bold or underlined. Basically, all you can do to format iPhone text message text is double tap the shift key to type in all caps, or use emojis.
This can be a bit demoralizing, as learning how to italicize in iMessage would be a pretty cool feature, since we are accustomed to seeing things in certain ways in that app.
But, at least for now, italics in iMessage are something that we will need to live without until Apple either finds a way to enable iMessage italics, or we are able to copy and paste italics on iMessage from other apps.
Matthew Burleigh has been a freelance writer since the early 2000s. You can find his writing all over the Web, where his content has collectively been read millions of times.
Matthew received his Master’s degree in Computer Science, then spent over a decade as an IT consultant for small businesses before focusing on writing and website creation.
The topics he covers for MasterYourTech.com include iPhones, Microsoft Office, and Google Apps.
You can read his full bio here.