figlet -f slant "hello"
FIGlet online: generate ASCII text banners
Run FIGlet in your browser. Type a word, choose one of 35 FIGlet fonts and copy a multi-line ASCII banner for your README, terminal or chat. Nothing to install.
In the terminal above, type text Hello then font Slant. On a phone, use the text field and font chips.
What is FIGlet?
FIGlet is a small program that turns ordinary text into large letters built from ordinary characters. Glenn Chappell and Ian Chai wrote it in 1991, and the name stands for Frank, Ian and Glenn's Letters. It is still packaged by most Linux distributions and Homebrew, and its font format has been ported to JavaScript, Python, Go and many other languages; asciify.art uses a JavaScript port, so the banners match what figlet prints in a terminal.
Every FIGlet font is a plain-text .flf file that describes how each letter looks as a block of characters, plus a header with the letter height and layout rules. Hundreds of fonts exist, from compact two-line styles to tall 3D and shadowed letters.
Smushing and kerning
What makes FIGlet output look hand-drawn is how letters are joined. In full-width layout each letter keeps its own box. Kerning slides letters together until they touch. Smushing goes one step further and merges the touching edge into a single character, following rules from the FIGfont specification: equal characters merge, underscores yield to other strokes, opposite brackets become a bar, and the pair >< collapses into an X. The font file decides which rules apply, which is why Standard looks tight and Banner looks blocky.
Using FIGlet banners in a README or MOTD
- GitHub README: wrap the banner in a fenced code block so spacing survives; keep it under about 80 columns for narrow screens.
- Terminal MOTD: save the banner to
/etc/motd(or print it from your shell profile) to greet every login. - Code comments and CLIs: prefix each line with
#or//for file headers, or print it as a startup splash.
Font samples
_____ ___ ____ _ _ | ___|_ _/ ___| | ___| |_ | |_ | | | _| |/ _ \ __| | _| | | |_| | | __/ |_ |_| |___\____|_|\___|\__|
__________________ __ / ____/ _/ ____/ /__ / /_ / /_ / // / __/ / _ \/ __/ / __/ _/ // /_/ / / __/ /_ /_/ /___/\____/_/\___/\__/
___ ___ ___ _ _ | __|_ _/ __| |___| |_ | _| | | (_ | / -_) _| |_| |___\___|_\___|\__|
_ _ | | (_) | |__ _ | '_ \| | | | | | | |_| |_|_|
All 35 fonts in the generator (tap one to load “Hello” in that font):
Frequently asked questions
- Is this the same as the figlet command?
- It produces the same kind of output from the same .flf font files. The command-line program prints to your terminal; this page renders the banner in the browser, so you can preview fonts, add color or effects and copy the result without installing anything.
- How do I keep the banner aligned in a README?
- Paste it inside a fenced code block (three backticks) so GitHub renders it in a monospace font and keeps every space. Outside a code block, Markdown collapses spaces and the letters fall apart.
- Which FIGlet fonts are available?
- 35 fonts, including Standard, Slant, Small, Big, Banner, Block, Doom, Shadow, ANSI Shadow, 3D-ASCII, Graffiti, Isometric1 and Star Wars. Type 'font' in the terminal to list them all.