Yes, Canva supports ligatures. It added built-in ligature and kerning controls with its Canva Create 2025 updates, so older advice saying Canva doesn’t support them is out of date.
Here’s where to find the setting, what it changes and why some special characters in your font might still be unavailable.
How to turn on ligatures in Canva
According to Canva’s text-formatting instructions:
- Select your text in the editor.
- Open Advanced settings, then More settings.
- Select the Advanced tab.
- Under Typography, switch Ligatures on.
- Select Change all.
You’ll find the Kerning setting in the same section.
Screenshot: Typeheist. This shows the 2025 interface, where the controls appear under Advanced formatting → Typography. Menu labels may differ from Canva’s current instructions above.
A closer look at the Typography panel, with Kerning and Ligatures enabled. Source: Typeheist.
To check the difference, duplicate your text box and compare the same word with ligatures switched off and on. Keep the font, size and spacing identical.
Try office, which contains an ffi sequence, or flight, which contains fl. These are useful test words, provided your font includes those combinations. Look closely: the change might be a small adjustment around a join or a dot.
When did Canva start supporting ligatures?
Canva introduced ligature and kerning controls with its Canva Create 2025 updates. Its official announcement dated 5 May 2025 confirms the features were available by then. That’s a verified availability date, rather than proof that every account received the feature on that particular day. Before this update, Canva didn’t offer these built-in controls—which explains why older tutorials still point readers towards workarounds.
What does a ligature actually change?
A ligature replaces a sequence of letters with a single designed glyph—the visual form used to display those letters.
Some letters clash when you put them next to each other. In some typefaces, the top of an f overlaps awkwardly with the dot on the following i. A ligature gives the designer a chance to redraw that combination so the shapes fit comfortably together.
Common examples include fi, fl, ff, ffi and ffl, although the available combinations depend on the font.
The OpenType specification calls the feature intended for normal use Standard Ligatures, identified by the tag liga. The designer decides which combinations belong in it.
If your font doesn’t contain an ffi ligature, switching ligatures on won’t create one.
For visual examples, see my guide to how ligatures work in Pumped Up Kicks. It shows how individual letter combinations change the shape of a whole word.
Why some special characters still won’t appear
A font specimen might show connected letters, alternative capitals and long decorative endings together. They look like a collection of extra characters, but the font can organise them under different OpenType features.
| Feature | What it does |
|---|---|
Standard ligatures (liga) |
Replaces letter combinations with forms intended for normal use |
Discretionary ligatures (dlig) |
Provides optional combinations for particular typographic effects |
Stylistic alternates (salt) |
Offers alternative designs for characters |
Swashes (swsh) |
Provides flourished or embellished letterforms |
These are separate features. A ligature control doesn’t automatically promise access to all of them.
You also can’t reliably identify the feature just by looking at the lettering. A decorative connection might sit under standard ligatures in one font and discretionary ligatures in another. What matters is how the designer built the substitution into that particular font.
In font production, drawing the character and setting up the rule that makes it appear are separate tasks. The application also needs to support that rule. A character can exist in your font without the application giving you a direct way to select it.
Does Canva support discretionary ligatures?
Canva documents a ligature toggle, but doesn’t specify whether it activates discretionary ligatures. If you need a particular combination, check the font’s instructions and test it in Canva before relying on it.
Why aren’t my ligatures showing in Canva?
There are a few things worth checking before you start clicking the same switch repeatedly.
Check the font’s examples
Look at the designer’s specimen or documentation and type a combination it explicitly includes. Match the case: a lowercase fi ligature doesn’t mean there’s an uppercase FI equivalent.
Keep the letters together
Test the whole word in one text box using the same font and formatting. Separate text boxes won’t give the application a continuous sequence to substitute.
Check the font version
Make sure you’re using the same font, weight and version shown in the specimen. Different releases or styles may contain different features.
If you need help from the designer, send the exact word and a screenshot. “The ffi in ‘office’ doesn’t change” gives them something useful to investigate.
What’s the difference between ligatures and kerning?
Ligatures change the glyphs used to display letters. Kerning adjusts the spacing between particular glyph combinations.
Kerning might bring the o closer to the T in “To”. A ligature might replace separate f and i forms with one combined drawing. You can use both.
General letter spacing is different again. It changes spacing across a selection, while kerning deals with particular combinations that need attention.
If a pair of letters has an awkward gap, investigate kerning. If their shapes collide, a ligature may solve the problem—provided the font includes one.
Should you leave ligatures switched on?
Keep them when they improve the word at its final reading size. Standard ligatures often resolve small collisions; more elaborate combinations need judging in context. Check the result rather than assuming the setting always improves it.
Written by Simon Stratford, type designer and graphic designer. These are my opinions, reached after too little sleep and too much coffee. You can also follow my antics on @itsmesimonok, or leave a comment below. Despite all the opinions, I’m actually quite nice.