Changing the look of Comment balloons in Word
How to change the font and font size of Comment balloons in Word
Recently we wrote about the Word Comments feature and how it can be used even for a solo author.
The standard comments font is Calibri 10pt but that can be changed by changing the style linked to the comments text – the style is called ‘Balloon Text’ as you can see in this deliberately ‘over the top’ example.
The ‘Balloon Text’ style is somewhat buried in the style list. It won’t show up until used and even then isn’t on the ‘Recommended’ list determined by Microsoft.
To access ‘Balloon Text’ style, or any other obscure style, go to the Manage Styles dialog. Ctrl+Alt+Shift+S takes you to the Style display then click on the Manage Styles button on the bottom row.
Scroll down the styles list to find Balloon Text. You’ll probably have to change the Sort Order to ‘Alphabetical’ to have a fighting chance of finding the style in the loooong list.
From there just change the style settings just like any other style.
The most common change is to increase the font size a little to 11pt or 12pt for easier reading.
Naturally this change can apply to the standard Normal.dot template or you can have your own ‘Balloon Text’ style in a custom template.
And you can still change the font and other settings within a single comment just like any other text.
See Also
- Disappearing comment lines in Word 2013
- One person Comments in Word
- Info pane in Word 2010
- Cleaning docs without Word
- Editing vs Comments in Word
- Easy Reviewing with Word, part 2
- Easy Reviewing with Word – part 1