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Apply styles



By default, applying a paragraph style won’t remove any existing character formatting or character styles applied to part of a paragraph, although you have the option of removing existing formatting when you apply a style. A plus sign (+) appears next to the current paragraph style in the Styles panel if the selected text uses a character or paragraph style and also uses additional formatting that isn’t part of the applied style. Such additional formatting is called an override or local formatting.

Character styles remove or reset character attributes of existing text if those attributes are defined by the style.

Apply a character style

  1. Select the characters to which you want to apply the style.
  2. Do one of the following:

    • Click the character style name in the Character Styles panel.

    • Select the character style name from the drop-down list in the Control panel.

    • Press the keyboard shortcut you assigned to the style. (Make sure that Num Lock is on.)

Apply a paragraph style

  1. Click in a paragraph, or select all or part of the paragraphs to which you want to apply the style.
  2. Do one of the following:

    • Click the paragraph style name in the Paragraph Styles panel.

    • Select the paragraph style name from the menu in the Control panel.

    • Press the keyboard shortcut you assigned to the style. (Make sure that Num Lock is on.)

  3. If any unwanted formatting remains in the text, choose Clear Overrides from the Paragraph Styles panel.

Apply sequential styles to multiple paragraphs

The Next Style option specifies which style will be automatically applied when you press Enter or Return after applying a particular style. It also lets you apply different styles to multiple paragraphs in a single action.

For example, suppose you have three styles for formatting a newspaper column: Title, Byline, and Body. Title uses Byline for Next Style, Byline uses Body for Next Style, and Body uses [Same Style] for Next Style. If you select an entire article, including the title, the author’s byline, and the paragraphs in the article, and then apply the Title style using the special “Next Style” command in the context menu, the article’s first paragraph will be formatted with the Title style, the second paragraph will be formatted with the Byline style, and all other paragraphs will be formatted with the Body style.

Before and after applying a style with Next Style.

  1. Select the paragraphs to which you want to apply the styles.
  2. In the Paragraph Styles panel, right-click (Windows) or Control-click (Mac OS) the parent style, and then choose Apply [Style Name] Then Next Style.

If the text includes formatting overrides or character styles, the context menu also lets you remove overrides, character styles, or both.