Creating, updating, and applying styles in LibreOffice Writer is a powerful way to achieve
consistent, professional formatting across your documents. Styles in LibreOffice Writer
define the appearance of various elements of a document, such as paragraphs, headings,
characters, and lists. Once you define styles, you can apply them easily, and any changes to
the style will automatically update all elements that use that style.
Here’s a detailed guide to help you learn how to use and manage styles effectively:
1. Understanding Styles in LibreOffice Writer
In LibreOffice Writer, styles can be grouped into several types, each serving a specific
purpose:
Paragraph Styles: These styles apply to entire paragraphs and control aspects like
font, alignment, spacing, indents, and more.
Character Styles: These affect individual characters or words within a paragraph,
such as bold, italics, or font size, without changing the paragraph.
Page Styles: These styles apply to the layout of the entire page, including margins,
page borders, and headers/footers.
List Styles: These styles define the appearance of numbered or bulleted lists.
Frame Styles: These control how objects (like images or text boxes) are displayed
and positioned in the document.
2. Creating Styles
Paragraph Styles:
1. Open the Styles and Formatting window:
o You can open the Styles and Formatting window by pressing F11 or going to
the View menu and selecting Styles.
2. Create a New Paragraph Style:
o In the Styles and Formatting window, click on the New Style from Selection
button (the icon looks like a page with a star).
o Choose Paragraph Style from the dropdown list.
o You’ll be prompted to name the style. Choose a descriptive name (e.g.,
"Heading 1" or "Body Text").
3. Customize the Style:
o After naming the style, you can modify it. The Style Settings dialog box will
allow you to adjust several properties, such as:
Font: Change the font family, size, and color.
Alignment: Set the alignment to left, center, right, or justified.
Spacing: Adjust the space before or after paragraphs and line spacing.
Indents: Define left and right indents, and first-line indents.
Borders and Shading: Add borders or background colors.
o You can access these options under different tabs, such as Font, Indents &
Spacing, Alignment, and Borders.
Character Styles:
1. Create a New Character Style:
oOpen the Styles and Formatting window, click on the Character Styles button
(a letter "A").
o Right-click within the Character Styles section and choose New.
o Define the style’s properties (font, size, color, etc.) and click OK when
finished.
2. Apply Character Style:
o Select the text you want to modify and then double-click the character style
you created from the Styles and Formatting window.
3. Applying Styles
Applying styles is simple and ensures that your document maintains consistency.
To Apply a Paragraph Style:
o Click inside the paragraph you want to format, then either:
Double-click the desired paragraph style in the Styles and Formatting
window.
Right-click the style and choose Apply.
To Apply a Character Style:
o Select the text you want to style, then either:
Double-click the character style in the Styles and Formatting window.
Right-click the style and select Apply.
To Apply a Page Style:
o Go to the Format menu and select Page Style.
o In the Page Style dialog, choose the style you want to apply to the entire page.
4. Updating and Modifying Styles
One of the key benefits of using styles is the ability to update them globally. If you change a
style, all the text or elements using that style will be updated automatically.
To Update a Style:
1. Modify a Style:
o Right-click the style in the Styles and Formatting window and select Modify.
o Make your desired changes (e.g., font size, color, alignment).
2. Apply the Changes:
o Click OK. All paragraphs or text with that style will update instantly to reflect
the changes.
To Update Multiple Styles at Once:
Update via Template:
o If you're using a template and want to change a style for all future documents,
you can save the modified document as a template by going to File >
Templates > Save as Template. Once saved, you can apply this template to
other documents.
5. Using Style Groups
In larger documents, you may need multiple types of styles for different sections (like
chapters, subsections, headings, body text, etc.). You can use style groups to organize your
styles.
To create a new style group:
o Open the Styles and Formatting window.
o Right-click on the Paragraph Styles or Character Styles and choose New
Group.
o Name your group and drag and drop styles into the group for better
organization.
6. Using the Style Inspector
The Style Inspector is a helpful tool that lets you see exactly which styles are applied to
selected text and helps you troubleshoot formatting issues.
To open the Style Inspector:
o Go to Tools > Style Inspector.
o Click on a piece of text, and the inspector will show which styles are applied.
You can also clear specific styles if necessary.
7. Creating and Using Templates
Once you've set up a consistent set of styles for your document, you can save the document
as a template. Templates are especially useful for creating documents with a fixed format
(like reports, resumes, or newsletters).
To Create a Template:
o Once you’ve applied all the desired styles to a document, go to File >
Templates > Save as Template.
o Give your template a name and choose a category.
o Click Save.
To Use a Template:
o Go to File > New > Templates and select your saved template.
8. Benefits of Using Styles
Consistency: Using styles ensures that your formatting remains consistent throughout
the document, making it easier to manage.
Efficiency: You can quickly change the format of an entire document by modifying a
single style.
Professional Appearance: Applying styles ensures that your document looks
polished and well-structured.
Faster Formatting: Instead of manually formatting each paragraph, you can apply
styles quickly and uniformly.
9. Advanced Styling (Optional)
Linking Styles: You can link a paragraph style to a character style so that when you
apply a paragraph style, the character style is also applied automatically. This is
useful for maintaining consistency in font types and sizes for headings or other styled
text.
Conditional Styles: Conditional styles allow text to change dynamically based on
conditions (like changing the style based on the content of the paragraph)
