Minecraft Universe Wiki
Register
Advertisement
Minecraft Formatting

A book showing the possible formatting options with the character that performs them.

Text in Minecraft can be formatted with the section sign (§). The section sign cannot be entered via Minecraft itself; a map editor is required to edit the text to enter the § character.

Color codes[]

Colors

Hex digit to color mapping. Use § followed by the corresponding color letter/number; e.g. §e will give you yellow.

Messages sent from the server to the client can contain color codes, which allow coloring of text for various purposes.

A section sign (§) followed by a hex digit in the message tells the client to switch colors while displaying text.

Code Official Name[note 1] Foreground Color Background Color
R G B Hex R G B Hex
§0 Black 0 0 0 000000 0 0 0 000000
§1 Dark Blue 0 0 170 0000AA 0 0 42 00002A
§2 Dark Green 0 170 0 00AA00 0 42 0 002A00
§3 Dark Aqua 0 170 170 00AAAA 0 42 42 002A2A
§4 Dark Red 170 0 0 AA0000 42 0 0 2A0000
§5 Dark Purple 170 0 170 AA00AA 42 0 42 2A002A
§6 Gold 255 170 0 FFAA00 42 42 0 2A2A00
§7 Gray 170 170 170 AAAAAA 42 42 42 2A2A2A
§8 Dark Gray 85 85 85 555555 21 21 21 151515
§9 Blue 85 85 255 5555FF 21 21 63 15153F
§a Green 85 255 85 55FF55 21 63 21 153F15
§b Aqua 85 255 255 55FFFF 21 63 63 153F3F
§c Red 255 85 85 FF5555 63 21 21 3F1515
§d Light Purple 255 85 255 FF55FF 63 21 63 3F153F
§e Yellow 255 255 85 FFFF55 63 63 21 3F3F15
§f White 255 255 255 FFFFFF 63 63 63 3F3F3F
  1. As used in Scoreboard commands. (Note: For Scoreboard commands you have to replace the space in the name with a underscore (_), and the first letter should be a lower case.)

Formatting codes[]

Text can also be formatted using the § symbol followed by a letter.

[INFO] The § symbol cannot be used in Minecraft. Some Bukkit plugins allow you to use text via &. The § symbol may be used in the server.properties file and the Minecraft Server text box.

To make § on Windows with most US/UK English keyboards type Alt+21(MUST use the Number Pad)(To do this, hold Alt and press 2 lift your finger, then press 1. On a Mac US keyboard, Option+6 ( Option+5 for US Extended). On Linux with the compose key activated, type Compose, s, o. Alternatively, you can copy the character from this page, and press Ctrl+V to paste the character into a book. Note that this does NOT work on the Minecraft chat bar or Command Block GUI.

If a color code is used after a formatting code, the formatting code will be disabled beyond the color code point. For example, §cX§nY displays as XY, whereas §nX§cY displays as XY. Therefore, when using a color code in tandem with a formatting code, ensure the color code is used first and reuse the formatting code when changing colors.

§r can be used to reset all texts format beyond it, e.g. §nXXX§rYYY displays as XXXYYY

Code Official Name
§k Obfuscated
§l Bold
§m Strikethrough
§n Underline
§o Italic
§r Reset

Note: The random characters placed after §k will always be the same width as the original characters, except if using [ and ]. For example, any random character cycled through where the letter "m" would be wide characters while any random character in the spot an "i" would be narrow characters.

Example Text[]

The following text can be pasted into a Book and Quill to produce what is shown in the picture at the top of the page:

§nMinecraft Formatting

§r§00 §11 §22 §33
§44 §55 §66 §77
§88 §99 §aa §bb
§cc §dd §ee §ff

§r§0k §kMinecraft
§rl §lMinecraft
§rm §mMinecraft
§rn §nMinecraft
§ro §oMinecraft
§rr §rMinecraft

Use in server.properties[]

Formatting codes can be used in the motd line in a server.properties file, but the section signs must be escaped as \u00A7. If a section sign is entered directly, the server will replace it with \u00C2\u00A7 (§); clients will display the \u00C2 character as a question mark. Delete the \u00C2 character in the MOTD if it comes with a bunch of question marks. This will happen if you are minecraft version 1.2.5 or below, or something is not compatible. Aside from these color characters, in 1.7+ you are able to add an extra line to your MOTD via \n.

Use in custom language packs[]

Formatting codes can also be used to colour item/achievement names/descriptions/block names by using § then any of the numbers/letters displayed above. This is also used in end.txt and credits.txt. An example of this is §bDiamond§r to make the name of a diamond appear in aqua coloured text.

Use in world names[]

With the use of external tools, such as NBTExplorer, world names can have custom colours and formatting codes. To modify the name, you can choose the LevelName tag in the world's level.dat. In this example, LevelName is set to:

§1R§2e§3d§4s§5t§6o§7n§8e §9C§ar§be§ca§dt§ei§fo§1n§2s

ColouredLevel

Advertisement