If you've been hunting for a roblox rich text markup guide to finally make your game's UI look like it wasn't made in 2008, you're in the right spot. Let's be real: plain, flat text is boring. Whether you're trying to highlight a player's name in a kill feed, make a "Shop" button pop, or add some flair to your dialogue systems, knowing how to manipulate text using markup is a total game-changer.
Roblox uses a system that's pretty similar to HTML or XML. If you've ever dabbled in web design, this will feel like second nature. If not, don't sweat it. It's actually pretty intuitive once you get the hang of the tags. In this guide, we're going to break down everything from the basic bold tags to the more complex stroke and transparency settings that can make your UI truly stand out.
First Things First: Enable the Property
Before you start typing code into your TextLabel or TextBox, there's one tiny step people always forget: you have to enable the RichText property.
Open up your Properties window in Roblox Studio, find your text-based object, and scroll down until you see the "RichText" checkbox. If this isn't checked, Roblox will just display your markup tags as literal text, and your UI will look like a mess of brackets and slashes. Once that's toggled on, we're ready to start styling.
The Bread and Butter: Bold, Italics, and Underlines
Let's start with the basics. These are the tags you'll probably use most often. They're short, sweet, and get the job done.
- Bold: Wrap your text in
and. - Italic: Use
and. - Underline: Throw in
and. - Strikethrough: Use
.
For example, if you write CRITICAL HIT!, the player is going to see a much more impactful message than just standard text. You can also nest these. If you want something bold and underlined, you'd do This is important!. Just make sure you close the tags in the reverse order you opened them. It keeps the engine happy.
Adding Color and Changing Size
This is where the roblox rich text markup guide gets fun. Changing the color of specific words within a single string is huge for readability. Instead of having to create five different TextLabels to make one word red, you can do it all in one line.
The syntax for color uses the tag. It looks like this: This is red text
You can use standard RGB values (0-255). This is super handy for things like rarity systems. You could have a legendary item name appear in gold and a common item in gray, all within the same inventory description box.
Changing the size is just as easy. If you want one word to be massive for emphasis, use: BIG
You can even combine them: Red and Large (Note: Roblox also supports Hex codes if you prefer those over RGB!)
Switching Up the Fonts
Sometimes the default font just doesn't fit the vibe of a specific character speaking. You can change the font family on the fly without changing the entire TextLabel's settings.
The tag looks like this: Why would you use this font?
You can use any font that's currently available in the Roblox Enum.Font list. This is great for RPGs where different NPCs might have different "voices." A grumpy blacksmith might use a bold, blocky font, while a magical fairy uses something more script-like and elegant.
Text Strokes (Outlines)
One of the most annoying things in UI design is when your text gets lost against a busy background. Traditionally, we'd use a UIStroke object, but that applies to the entire label. What if you only want an outline on one specific word?
Rich text has a dedicated
You can adjust the color, the thickness, and even the joins of the stroke. If you want a "glow" effect, you can use a bright color and a high transparency value for the stroke. Speaking of transparency
Transparency Control
Roblox lets you tweak the transparency of your text via markup too. This is great for "fading out" certain parts of a message or making secondary information less distracting.
This is semi-transparent
The value goes from 0 (fully visible) to 1 (invisible). If you combine this with the stroke tag, you can create some really slick effects, like hollow text where only the outline is visible:
Handling "Special" Characters
Here's a common headache: what if you actually want to show a "less than" symbol (<) in your text? Since Roblox uses that symbol to start a markup tag, it'll get confused and likely break your text.
To fix this, you need to use escape sequences. These tell Roblox, "Hey, don't treat this as code, just show the symbol." * For < use < * For > use > * For & use & * For " use " * For ' use '
It's a bit of a pain to type out, but it's the only way to keep your UI from breaking when you're displaying math or instructions.
Why Should You Care?
You might be thinking, "This seems like a lot of extra typing. Why not just use the Properties panel?"
Well, the power of a roblox rich text markup guide isn't just about making things look pretty; it's about efficiency. If you're scripting a system where players can chat, you can use these tags to highlight their usernames or rank titles automatically. If you're building a quest log, you can dynamically highlight the names of items the player needs to find.
It also saves on "Object Heavy" UIs. Instead of having a frame filled with 10 different TextLabels to achieve a multi-colored sentence, you have one single object. This is better for your game's performance and way easier to manage when you're trying to reorganize your UI layout.
A Few Pro Tips for Clean UI
- Don't Overdo It: Just because you can make every letter a different color, size, and font doesn't mean you should. It's easy to make your game look like a 90s website if you aren't careful. Use rich text to draw the eye, not to give your players a headache.
- Test for Readability: Always check how your rich text looks on different screen sizes. A font size that looks okay on a 27-inch monitor might be unreadable on a phone.
- Sanitize Player Input: If you allow players to use rich text in things like pet names or custom signs, be careful. They can use these tags to make their text massive or invisible, which might grief other players. You might want to strip certain tags out of player-generated strings.
- Use Comments in Code: If you're generating long strings of rich text in Luau scripts, it can get hard to read. Break your strings up or add comments so you remember what each section is doing.
Final Thoughts
Mastering the roblox rich text markup guide is one of those small skills that makes a huge difference in the perceived quality of your game. It's the difference between a game that looks "amateur" and one that looks "polished."
Next time you're working on a UI element, try swapping out those plain labels for some styled markup. Experiment with the stroke thickness, play with the font weights, and see how much more life you can breathe into your interface. Once you get used to the syntax, you'll wonder how you ever managed without it. Happy developing!