Use the rich text editor

The rich text editor is the shared editing surface behind text-heavy canvas work. Use it when the words inside an object matter, not just the object itself: a sticky note with a link, a text object that becomes a heading, a shape label, a spreadsheet cell with a checklist item, or a comment that mentions the person who needs to answer.

The editor is intentionally smaller than a document editor. It gives canvas content enough structure to be readable in place without turning every object into a separate document.

Where rich text editing appears

The editor is shared across several canvas writing surfaces, so the same habits carry over: keep headings short, use mentions when someone needs to respond, and use checklists only when the item is actually trackable.

If a control is missing in one surface, that does not mean the editor is broken. ALLO hides controls that do not apply to the current object, permission, selection, or composer.

Format canvas text

Select the text or place your cursor in the editable text, then use the visible toolbar controls. Depending on the surface, ALLO can show controls for bold, italic, underline, strikethrough, font family, font size, text color, highlight or background color, alignment, links, bullet lists, numbered lists, checklists, headings, quote, inline code, and code block.

A heading should mark a real section. A checklist should represent actionable items. Highlighting should draw attention to a decision, risk, or status. If every word is bold, nothing is.

Use style controls to make the canvas readable at normal zoom. If the formatting only works when everyone zooms in, simplify the object or split the content across multiple notes.

Choose fonts and sizes

Use the font family and font size controls when the text needs a clear role on the canvas: a large heading for a section, a compact label for a diagram, a handwritten-style note for workshop capture, or a monospace value for code-like content. Font choices are saved with the object text or cell content, so collaborators see the chosen style when they open the canvas.

ALLO's font menu is generated from the configured canvas font list. In the English font set, the current picker includes Satoshi, DM Sans, Google Sans, D-DIN, Cairo, Inter, Geist, Instrument Sans, Instrument Serif, Plus Jakarta Sans, Manrope, Outfit, Figtree, Bricolage Grotesque, Fraunces, Playfair Display, Permanent Marker, Gabarito, Newsreader, Inria Sans, Space Grotesk, Radio Canada, Open Sans, Roboto Mono, Roboto Slab, Libre Baskerville, Lato, Hind Siliguri, Jost, Montserrat, Lobster, Story Script, Handlee, DM Serif Text, Ubuntu, JetBrains Mono, IBM Plex Mono, Kode Mono, Oswald, and Verdana.

Choose a font family for the job the text is doing. Headings, labels, captions, and dense notes do not need the same treatment, especially on a canvas that will be reviewed on a shared screen.

The full menu can vary by language, country, workspace configuration, and your recent choices. Japanese and Korean font families can appear from the same canvas font configuration, and recent fonts may be shown at the top when they are still allowed. If a font you used before is missing, it may not be enabled for your current locale, country, or canvas environment.

Use a small number of font families per canvas. A good canvas usually has one readable default, one display choice for section labels, and maybe one specialty font for a deliberate visual cue. Too many fonts make the canvas harder to scan and can make copied or pasted text look inconsistent.

For a workshop page, this usually means using one quiet font for the body notes, a heavier size or weight for section labels, and a deliberately different voice only where it helps the room understand the canvas. A planning canvas can survive a handwritten marker font on the "open questions" area. It gets harder to trust when every sticky note, table heading, and decision label is trying to be the loudest object on the page.

For a technical review, a monospace font can help exact values read as exact values: API names, error codes, SQL snippets, pricing IDs, or small config fragments. Use that as a cue, not a costume, or collaborators stop seeing it as evidence and start seeing it as decoration.

Use links

Use the Link control, ⌘K on Mac, or Ctrl+K on Windows and Linux when selected text should open another place. Links can point to another ALLO canvas or to an external site. Canvas links still follow the destination canvas access; adding a link does not give the reader permission to open the target. For copied page, object, comment, and chat links, see Private links and share links in Canvas.

When you type a full web address and press Space or Enter, ALLO can format it as a link. Use this for quick capture, then rename the visible text when the URL is long or unclear. A link named "final pricing sheet" is more useful than a pasted URL that wraps across a sticky note.

If the link popup does not appear, make sure your cursor is inside editable text or that you have selected the text you want to link. Object-level links and copied object links are different from rich text links; use the Element menu when you want a link to the selected canvas object itself.

Use slash commands

In rich text surfaces that support slash commands, type / at the start of a line or after a space, then choose a command from the menu. Slash commands can apply common text formats such as heading, divider, bold, italic, underline, strikethrough, bullet list, numbered list, checklist, quote, inline code, code block, body text, and alignment.

The slash command menu filters as you type. For example, typing /check should narrow toward checklist-style formatting when that command is available. Press Enter to choose the focused command, or keep typing if you meant to write a literal slash phrase.

Canvas also has a separate slash-command tool picker in the main toolbar. That picker is for choosing canvas tools. The rich text / menu is for formatting the text you are currently editing.

Use checklists

Use checklist formatting for lightweight action items that belong inside the canvas content itself. A checklist inside a sticky note, text object, shape label, or spreadsheet cell can make a small set of next steps visible without creating a separate task system.

ALLO can collect checklist lines from canvas objects and spreadsheet cells into the canvas checklist view. From there, clicking an item can take you back to the source object or cell, and changing the checked state writes back to the original content.

Keep checklist lines short. If each item needs an assignee, due date, status, or long discussion, use the project or task workflow instead of hiding project management inside a sticky note.

Paste formatted text

Pasting into canvas text is designed to keep useful structure while stripping unsafe or noisy web-page styling. Common formatting such as headings, lists, safe colors, supported font families, code blocks, quotes, and safe http or https links can be preserved. Long web pages, copied documents, and browser selections may still be simplified so the result behaves like canvas text instead of a broken web page fragment.

Pasted URLs can become links when ALLO can read them safely. Unsafe link schemes and unusual control characters are ignored rather than turned into clickable links. If pasted text creates a plain URL, select it and use Link to make the destination explicit.

Pasted images are not meant to live as buried inline images inside a note or cell. If you paste or drop an image, ALLO may create a normal canvas image object through the image upload flow instead. That keeps images movable, previewable, commentable, and available for image-specific actions such as crop, replace, and background removal.

Mention collaborators

Type @ or use the mention control where it is available to insert a mention chip. Mentions are different from plain text: choosing a person, team, canvas, or all-canvas-members target from the picker creates structured mention data that ALLO can use for navigation and notifications.

For who can be mentioned, how Inbox and notifications work, and why a mention may not notify someone, see Mention people and canvas collaborators.

Keyboard behavior

While your cursor is inside a rich text editor, typing shortcuts belong to text editing first. Canvas tool shortcuts are intentionally quiet so a letter such as T, P, or S does not suddenly switch tools while you are writing.

Common editor shortcuts include ⌘B / Ctrl+B for bold, ⌘I / Ctrl+I for italic, ⌘U / Ctrl+U for underline, ⌘K / Ctrl+K for link, ⌘⇧7 / Ctrl+Shift+7 for numbered lists, ⌘⇧8 / Ctrl+Shift+8 for bulleted lists, and ⌘⇧9 / Ctrl+Shift+9 for checklists where the surface supports those commands. The same editor also supports slash-command formatting such as headings, dividers, quotes, inline code, code blocks, and alignment. For the full shortcut table, see Canvas shortcuts.

Press Enter for a new paragraph or list item. In spreadsheet cells, Enter can stay inside the active cell editor when you are editing cell text, while Tab moves through cells unless you are inside an indented list. In checklist text, ALLO also supports keyboard behavior for toggling checklist state from the editor in supported contexts. If a shortcut seems to affect the canvas instead of the text, click back into the editable text and try again.

When controls are not available

If the toolbar looks wrong, decide whether you are editing text or selecting the object first. That one distinction explains most surprises.

What can go wrong

If formatting does not apply, your cursor may not be inside the editable text, the selected object may be locked, or the current surface may not support that format. Reselect the text, confirm you have edit access, and try the visible control again.

If a link opens for you but not for someone else, the destination may require access they do not have. Share the destination canvas or resource before relying on the link in review work.

If a mention looks like ordinary text, it may not have been chosen from the mention picker. Delete the typed name, type @ again, and select the target so ALLO inserts a mention chip.

If a long note or text object becomes hard to read, split it. Use a heading plus several shorter objects, or move the long explanation to a document and link to it from the canvas.