Give Text a Gradient or Rainbow Fill

SUMMARY: Make important text stand out with gradient or rainbow fills, and apply a multitude of display tweaks.


Interested in another way to make text stand out in a Microsoft Word 2010document? How about applying a Fog, Mahogany, or Chrome gradient fill to text, or making text appear with a rainbow of colors?1. Select the text you want to modify.

2. Apply a color if you want to use a standard gradient fill such as circular, linear, or diagonal. From the “Home” tab in the Ribbon, click the Font Color button and make your choice.

3. Now, click the Font Color button again and select “Gradient” from the pop-up menu that follows.

4. From here you can select one of several standard gradients.

Selecting a font Gradient Fill in Word 2010

Or, for more flexibility, click the “More Gradients” menu item.

5. The “Format Text Effects” dialog box appears. Click the “Gradient fill” radio button.

Accessing advanced Gradient Fill effects in Word 2010

The amount of options may be intimidating. You may instead want to choose from several pre-made effects such as Gold, Late Sunset, Ocean, and Rainbow II. If so, click the pull-down next to “Preset colors” and make your selection.

Using a pre-made Gradient text Fill effect in Word 2010

Other options are as follows:

* Type – Choose between a linear, radial, rectangular, or path gradient.

* Direction – Change the gradient direction.

* Angle -Alter the sharpness of the gradient angle.

* Gradient Stops – Here you can exercise more fine control over the stops in the gradient. You can click and drag the stops as sliders to change their position. The + and X “Add gradient stop” and “Remove gradient stop” buttons modify the number of stops as desired. You can have up to 10 stops.

* Color – Instead of choosing a preset color scheme, choose a base gradient color from theme and standard colors provided. Or, click “More Colors” from the pop-up menu to choose from any color.

* Position – Changes the starting position where the first gradient stop lies.

* Brightness – Make the gradient text lighter or darker.

* Transparency – The greater the number, the more transparent the text.

6. When done, click “Close” on the bottom-right of the dialog box to finalize your choices and apply your gradient fill.