About text style types
There are no restrictions on what text attributes and properties can be applied to a text style, regardless of its type. Instead, the type determines the predominant purpose of that text style.
There are three types of text style:
- Paragraph—used to define the properties of paragraphs.
- Character—used to define the properties of individual glyphs (or words, lines and sentences inside a paragraph).
- Group—used to define the properties for a group of text styles. Group styles are not applied directly to text. They are listed in the Text Styles panel, separately from the other styles, and clicking on them does nothing. Other styles can be based on group styles, which should be used to share formatting between the other styles, and/or as a way of organizing the Hierarchical view in the Text Styles panel.
Paragraph and Character text styles
Although text styles are assigned a type, Affinity Publisher gives you the option of applying paragraph and character text styles flexibly. For example, you can set paragraph styles to selected glyphs as if they are character styles, without affecting the style applied to the paragraph. To activate this feature, you must set the text style to Show in both panels.
Group text styles
A Group text style cannot be applied directly to text on the page. Instead it defines the foundations on which other text styles are built and allows you to quickly create a text style hierarchy.
Group text styles only display in the Text Styles panel and are best understood when Show hierarchical is set on the panel's Panel Preferences.
The Group style can be considered as the group's parent or master text style. All other styles which are based on a Group style are considered to be child or subordinate styles.
You can create subordinate text styles within a group by selecting the Group text style as the Based on style.
You can display text styles in hierarchical groupings by checking Show Hierarchical from the Text Styles panel's Preferences.
