Aesthetic Text Generator

Each style is a different Unicode trick. Knowing which trick sits behind a style tells you where it will hold up and where it may break.

A few samples from our own test phrases: ｇｏｏｄ ｖｉｂｅｓ ｏｎｌｙ in Vaporwave, g o o d v i b e s in Spaced and g̶o̶o̶d̶ ̶v̶i̶b̶e̶s̶ in Strikethrough. The vaporwave aesthetic is often stylized as AESTHETICS in fullwidth characters, which is where the name of this kind of tool comes from.

Fullwidth letters take about twice the width of normal letters on screen, because that is how the forms were designed. Strikethrough can look broken in some typefaces, since each letter carries its own stroke.

Example: a creator runs a weekly planning account called Sunday Reset and wants a header line with a retro feel. This is an illustration of how we would use the tool, not a real account.

1. They type Sunday Reset into Enter Your Text. The counter shows 12 characters.
2. They compare styles. Vaporwave gives Ｓｕｎｄａｙ Ｒｅｓｅｔ, which looks right but takes about twice the space of the plain phrase.
3. They copy the Vaporwave version for the first line of the bio.
4. They type the rest in plain text: what the account posts, how often, and a link in the link field.
5. They check the profile on a second phone to confirm no letter shows as a box.

The result is one styled line that sets the mood and plain text for everything a reader or a search box needs. We suggest this split for almost every bio.

Styled characters look like letters to sighted readers, but software treats them as different symbols. That has real costs.

• Screen readers: the disability charity Scope explains that screen readers may skip these characters entirely or read something irrelevant. A styled letter can be announced as something like "mathematical sans-serif script t", so a short word takes a long time to hear.
• Silence: designer Per Axbom shows a demo where a screen reader says nothing at all for the styled words in a sentence.
• Search: styled text is not found by a normal search, because the characters differ from typed letters. Your name in aesthetic text may not match a search for your name.
• Display: older devices may show question marks or empty boxes instead of the styled letters.

Unicode itself says its mathematical letters should not be used in general text as a substitute for formatting. Scope's advice is to ask whether you need the special characters at all, and to use plain text for broad audiences. We agree: keep aesthetic text to a word or a short line, and never put names you want found, prices, dates or instructions in it.

• Character limits: Strikethrough, Dotted and Underline add a hidden mark to every letter, so the text holds about twice as many characters as it shows. That can push a bio over its limit.
• Restricted fields: usernames, handles and display names often accept only plain letters. Expect some apps to reject or strip styled text.
• Digits and accents: styles cover basic Latin letters best. Numbers, accented letters and other scripts may come through unchanged.
• Readability: view the result at real size on a phone. Spaced and wide text get hard to scan past a few words.
• Second device: the preview shows what your browser can display, not what every viewer sees.