How to make bold and italic text on WhatsApp
WhatsApp supports bold, italic and strikethrough — but the markers are single characters, not the doubles you may have picked up in Markdown. One asterisk on each side of a whole word bolds it; one asterisk dropped into the middle of a word does nothing at all. Here is the complete syntax, the rule that catches everybody out, and when to stop using markup.
Why WhatsApp formatting disappears
Every messaging app draws your message from the plain characters you sent, then looks for a short list of marker characters. WhatsApp's is remarkably small: the asterisk, the underscore, the tilde and the backtick.
That is exactly why formatting copied from somewhere else arrives plain. A web page sends the letters plus a hidden tag saying “render these bold”, which WhatsApp is not built to read. Word and Google Docs are worse: their bold is a font attribute that never leaves the document at all.
The same happens on the way out. Send *sold* and your friend sees sold. Copy that word into a notes app and the asterisks reappear, because the styling belonged to the message, not to the text they selected.
Formatting is applied per message. The limit itself is generous — roughly 65,000 characters — so length is not what stops you; the split is. An asterisk opened at the end of one bubble and closed in the next has nothing to connect to, so both markers turn back into literal characters.
WhatsApp's formatting syntax
This is the whole set WhatsApp recognises when you type it yourself, and it behaves identically on Android, iPhone, WhatsApp Web and the desktop app. There are no client settings to turn on.
| Style | Type this | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Bold | *bold* | Bold. One asterisk each side. |
| Italic | _italic_ | Italic. One underscore each side. |
| Bold and italic together | ***both*** | Not supported. Styles do not nest; the asterisks show up literally. |
| Strikethrough | ~struck~ | Struck through. One tilde each side, not two. |
| Monospace | ```monospace``` | Fixed-width block. Three backticks, not one. |
| Quote | > quoted line | Indented quote. The marker must be first on the line. |
| List | • item or 1. item | Bulleted or numbered list. |
| Heading | *Heading, **Heading, ***Heading | Bold text, heavier with each extra asterisk, up to three levels. |
| Underline | — | Not available. A WhatsApp message has no underline style. |
| Link with custom text | — | Not available. Only a bare URL is auto-linked. |
Two gaps to plan around. WhatsApp has no underline and no way to hide a URL behind custom link text. The formatter here handles both honestly: an underline is rendered as italic, the nearest style WhatsApp can draw, and a link is emitted as the bare address rather than a label that would come out as literal brackets.
The asterisk rule that catches everyone
WhatsApp only applies bold or italic to a complete word or phrase. The opening marker has to sit before the first character of a word and the closing marker after its last one. Put them anywhere inside a word and WhatsApp treats them as ordinary characters: the text stays in the normal weight and the markers sit there looking like a typo.
This is the single most common WhatsApp formatting failure. super*califragilistic* does not bold the middle of the word. It renders exactly as typed, asterisks included, because there is no word boundary at the opening marker. The same applies to re*boot*, to 2*4*6, and to any attempt to emphasise a single letter inside a word.
The fix is to widen the run to the whole word: *supercalifragilistic* bolds cleanly. Where you need only part of a word, markup has no answer at all — which is the moment to switch to Unicode.
One more escape to know: a genuine asterisk needs a backslash in front of it, written \*. WhatsApp drops the backslash and prints the asterisk. Without it, a footnote like 5* can leave the next line unstyled.
When to switch to Unicode text
Unicode styling replaces each letter with a character that already has the shape you want. There is no marker to lose, and it escapes the word-boundary rule completely because every character is styled on its own.
This pays off most in the fields that are plain text with no formatting at all: your About section, profile status and group descriptions. Type *bold* into one and the asterisks are stored as real characters, so your profile shows them literally, with no warning.
Why these render on WhatsApp specifically. The app draws messages with the device's system font and falls back to other installed fonts when a character is missing, rather than printing a blank box. The Mathematical Alphanumeric Symbols block behind these styles is core Unicode, so it is present on essentially every phone WhatsApp runs on — and because the styling travels as characters, it is immune to the copy-and-paste problem that breaks markup.
Two honest caveats. Unicode costs characters: a styled letter above U+FFFF is stored as a surrogate pair and counts as two, which only matters in a very long announcement. And decorative styles cost legibility in running text — keep them for names and headings, not for a paragraph.
Common mistakes
- Using two asterisks out of Markdown habit.
**bold**is not WhatsApp syntax: the first opens a run and the second closes it immediately, leaving a bold word wrapped in the markers you typed. - Using two underscores.
__italic__fails the same way. WhatsApp never implemented the double-underscore form, and this is the most common habit carried over from Discord or Reddit. - Expecting
***both***to give bold italic. WhatsApp does not nest styles, so the markers collide and you usually end up with literal asterisks in the message. - Bolding the middle of a word.
super*califragilistic*stays plain. Bold the entire word, or drop the markup and style the characters instead. - Using markup in a plain-text field. About text, group descriptions and status fields support no formatting, so markers are stored as visible characters.
- Forgetting to escape a real asterisk. A price or a footnote marker needs
\*in front of it. Left unescaped, one stray asterisk can swallow the formatting of everything that follows.
Frequently asked questions
Why does my bold text not work in WhatsApp?
Two reasons account for nearly every failure. First, WhatsApp uses one asterisk on each side, not two: **bold** leaves the markers on screen, because the first opens a run and the second closes it around an empty span.
Second, WhatsApp only styles a whole word or phrase. An asterisk inside a word, as in super*califragilistic*, is an ordinary character and the text stays plain.
How do I bold a single word in WhatsApp?
Put one asterisk directly in front of the word and one directly after it, with no space touching the letters, so *word* comes out bold.
The markers have to sit on the outer edges rather than inside. You can use this as many times as you like in one message, but it will not work on a fragment of a word or a lone letter inside one.
Can I make bold and italic text at the same time in WhatsApp?
No. WhatsApp does not nest styles, so ***both*** does not produce bold italic. The markers collide and the asterisks usually appear literally.
Send the text as two messages with each style applied separately, or generate it as Unicode, where every letter already carries both shapes.
How do I underline text in WhatsApp?
You cannot. A WhatsApp message has no underline style, and no marker produces one.
The formatter here converts an underline request to italic, the nearest style WhatsApp can genuinely render. If you truly need a line under the words, use Unicode text with combining underline marks, or switch the emphasis to bold.
Does WhatsApp formatting work in my About section and group descriptions?
No. Your About text, profile status and group descriptions are plain text fields with no formatting at all. Typing *bold* in one of them stores the asterisks as real characters, so your profile shows them literally, with no warning.
Every style in those fields has to come from the characters themselves, which means Unicode: generate it in a tool, copy it, and paste it straight into the field.
Will Unicode text show up correctly on WhatsApp for everyone?
Yes, for the styles worth using. WhatsApp draws messages with the device's system font and falls back to other installed fonts when a character is missing, rather than showing a blank box. The Mathematical Alphanumeric Symbols block behind these styles is core Unicode, so it ships with Windows, macOS, Android and iOS.
Because the styling travels as characters rather than as markers, it survives copying out of the chat, forwarding, and reading a screenshot back by hand.