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Is there a way to select a specific weight of a given font family to use for new messages, either in the GUI or by directly modifying a preferences file somewhere?

There doesn't appear to be a method for selecting a particular font weight in the new message default font dialogue box. For example: I can select Calibri, but not specifically Calibri Light.

default font selection dialog box

However, once I've started a new message, I can use the drop-down font selection box and select choose..., which brings up a totally different dialog that enables me to select light from the typeface list box.

enter image description here

Adam Wuerl
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3 Answers3

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Open the Outlook plist file.

Location of Outlook 2011 plist file

Edit the HTMLWebPrefsIdentifierWebKitStandardFont key to call out the desired font, e.g.:

<key>HTMLWebPrefsIdentifierWebKitStandardFont</key>  
<string>Calibri-Light</string>
Adam Wuerl
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  • Minor note: to see the ~/Library folder in Finder, execute "chflags nohidden ~/Library/" – David Hergert Nov 24 '14 at 21:16
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    Even better, you don't need Finder... just execute

    "defaults write com.microsoft.Outlook.plist HTMLWebPrefsIdentifierWebKitStandardFont Calibri-Light"

    Something I just realized: on OSX the font is "Calibri-Light" but on Windows its called "Calibri Light" so when people view your emails on Windows, it will look like crap. I don't understand why they can't be named the same. It appears OSX (or at least Outlook) uses the font's PostScript name.

     – David Hergert Nov 24 '14 at 22:20
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As far as I have found on Google, there's no way to increase font size, unless you zoom the whole page.

However, if you think that solution would fit your needs, i found this link that sets up a workaround, in order to zoom only some applications.

Outlook 2011, font too small

Andrea Gottardi
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  • Not really what I was looking for, as I want to change the default font weight and not the font size, but your answer pointed me to what I needed to change in the Outlook plist file, which I'll included in an answer below. So thatnks. – Adam Wuerl May 21 '13 at 17:54
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For anyone looking for how to do this for Outlook 2016 for Mac (since the preference plist isn't used for 2016)

Use defaults on the terminal like so:

defaults write com.microsoft.Outlook HTMLWebPrefsIdentifierWebKitStandardFont Font-Weight

In my case I wanted Gotham in Book weight so I put Gotham-Book where Font-Weight is.

coagmano
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