Italic
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Standard
Italic (SGR 3) is an SGR attribute that renders text in an italic or oblique style.
Syntax
CSI 3 m SGR 3 — Italic
CSI 23 m SGR 23 — Not italic, not Fraktur
Formal syntax
SGR-italic = 0x1b, "[", "3", "m" ; SGR-not-italic = 0x1b, "[", "23", "m" ;
Description
Per ECMA-48 §8.3.117, SGR parameter 3 selects "italicized." Text is rendered using the italic variant of the current font, or an oblique (slanted) version if no true italic is available.
Italic is reset by SGR 23 or SGR 0. Note that SGR 23 also cancels Fraktur (SGR 20), though Fraktur is rarely supported.
Italic support requires the terminal's font to include an italic face. If the font lacks italics, some terminals synthesize an oblique style by slanting the glyphs.
Examples
printf '\e[3mItalic text\e[23m Normal text\n'
printf '\e[1;3mBold italic\e[0m\n'
Specifications
| Specification | Section |
|---|---|
| VT510 Reference | — |
Terminal support
| Terminal | Support | Version | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Terminal Emulators | |||
| Alacritty | ✓ | Yes | |
| Bobcat | ? | ? | Implemented in external TerminalCtrl library, not in Bobcat source code |
| contour | ✓ | v0.1.0 | |
| foot | ✓ | Yes | Implemented at csi.c:94 |
| Ghostty | ✓ | v1.0.0 | |
| iTerm2 | ✓ | Yes | Italic attribute (SGR 3) fully supported via VT100CHARATTR_ITALIC in VT100GraphicRendition structure. |
| Kitty | ✓ | Yes | |
| Konsole | ✓ | Yes | SGR 3 sets RE_ITALIC rendition flag |
| mintty | ✓ | Yes | Implemented at src/termout.c:2121. Sets ATTR_ITALIC flag. |
| mlterm | ✓ | rel-3_3_7 | |
| PuTTY | ✗ | No | SGR 3 not implemented; no ATTR_ITALIC attribute exists |
| Rio | ✓ | v0.0.3 | |
| rxvt-unicode | ✓ | 6.1 | |
| st | ✓ | 0.4 | In 0.3 mapped to standout, proper implementation in 0.4 |
| terminology | ✓ | v0.1.0 | |
| VT100 | ✗ | No | |
| VTE | ✓ | Yes | |
| WezTerm | ✓ | Yes | |
| Windows Terminal | ✓ | Yes | SGR 3 sets italic attribute |
| xterm | ✓ | Yes | ECMA-48 2nd edition feature, requires OPT_WIDE_ATTRS |
| xterm.js | ✓ | 3.13.0 | |
| Multiplexers | |||
| cy | ✓ | v0.1.0 | |
| GNU Screen | ✓ | v.5.0.0 | SGR 3 mapped to A_IT attribute at src/ansi.c:1703 |
| tmux | ✓ | 0.8 | |
| tuios | ✓ | v0.0.15 | |
| Zellij | ✓ | v0.12.0 | |
See also
- Bold — SGR 1 — Increased intensity
- Underline — SGR 4 — Underlined text