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Dan Rodney/2 min read

Removing Paragraph & Character Styles

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Discover the process of removing paragraph and character styles in text, understand what local formatting is and learn the steps to remove local formatting and character styles.

Removing Paragraph & Character Styles

What is Local Formatting (Also Called an Override)?

This is when text is formatted differently than a paragraph or character style. Some examples are when the size of text is changed or a bold has been applied.

Removing Local Formatting (Overrides)

  1. Select some text, or just click anywhere in a paragraph.

  2. Open the Paragraph Styles panel (Type > Paragraph Styles).

  3. When text is formatted differently than a style (e.g., : bolded, italicized, tracked) a + will appear to the right of the style name as shown below.

    TIP: Mouse over the + and a tooltip will appear to tell you what the override is.

    paragraph style override

  4. To remove local formatting, click the Clear overrides button clear override button at the bottom of the panel.

    NOTE: If some text was selected, only those characters will revert to the style’s formatting, leaving the rest of the paragraph as is. If the cursor is sitting in the paragraph with nothing highlighted, then the entire paragraph will be wiped clean.

    HINT: You can also Option–click (Mac) or ALT–click (Windows) directly on the name of the style to wipe all local formatting from that whole paragraph.

Removing a Character Style

  1. Select some text that has a Character Style applied.

  2. Open the Character Styles panel (Type > Character Styles).

  3. You will see the name of the Character Style that is applied to that text. Click on [None] at the top of the panel to remove the style.

    character style applied