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BBCode in RichTextLabel

Introduction

Label nodes are great for displaying basic text, but they have limitations. If you want to change the color of the text, or its alignment, you can only do that to the entire label. You can’t make a part of the text have another color, or have a part of the text centered. To get around these limitations, you would use a RichTextLabel.

RichTextLabel allows for complex formatting of text using a markup syntax or the built-in API. It uses BBCodes for the markup syntax, a system of tags that designate formatting rules for a part of the text. You may be familiar with them if you ever used forums (also known as bulletin boards, hence the “BB” in “BBCode”).

Unlike Label, RichTextLabel also comes with its own vertical scrollbar. This scrollbar is automatically displayed if the text does not fit within the control’s size. The scrollbar can be disabled by unchecking the Scroll Active property in the RichTextLabel inspector.

Note that the BBCode tags can also be used to some extent in the XML source of the class reference. For more information, see Class reference primer.

See also

You can see how BBCode in RichTextLabel works in action using the Rich Text Label with BBCode demo project.

Using BBCode

By default, RichTextLabel functions like a normal Label. It has the property_text property, which you can edit to have uniformly formatted text. To be able to use BBCode for rich text formatting, you need to turn on the BBCode mode by setting bbcode_enabled. After that, you can edit the text property using available tags. Both properties are located at the top of the inspector after selecting a RichTextLabel node.

For example, BBCode [color=green]test[/color] would render the word “test” with a green color.

Most BBCodes consist of 3 parts: the opening tag, the content and the closing tag. The opening tag delimits the start of the formatted part, and can also carry some configuration options. Some opening tags, like the color one shown above, also require a value to work. Other opening tags may accept multiple options (separated by spaces within the opening tag). The closing tag delimits the end of the formatted part. In some cases, both the closing tag and the content can be omitted.

Unlike BBCode in HTML, leading/trailing whitespace is not removed by a RichTextLabel upon display. Duplicate spaces are also displayed as-is in the final output. This means that when displaying a code block in a RichTextLabel, you don’t need to use a preformatted text tag.

[tag]content[/tag]
[tag=value]content[/tag]
[tag option1=value1 option2=value2]content[/tag]
[tag][/tag]
[tag]

Note

RichTextLabel doesn’t support entangled BBCode tags. For example, instead of using:

[b]bold[i]bold italic[/b]italic[/i]

Use:

[b]bold[i]bold italic[/i][/b][i]italic[/i]

Handling user input safely

In a scenario where users may freely input text (such as chat in a multiplayer game), you should make sure users cannot use arbitrary BBCode tags that will be parsed by RichTextLabel. This is to avoid inappropriate use of formatting, which can be problematic if [url] tags are handled by your RichTextLabel (as players may be able to create clickable links to phishing sites or similar).

Using RichTextLabel’s [lb] and/or [rb] tags, we can replace the opening and/or closing brackets of any BBCode tag in a message with those escaped tags. This prevents users from using BBCode that will be parsed as tags – instead, the BBCode will be displayed as text.

Example of unescaped user input resulting in BBCode injection (2nd line) and escaped user input (3rd line)

The above image was created using the following script:

extends RichTextLabel
func _ready():
    append_chat_line("Player 1", "Hello world!")
    append_chat_line("Player 2", "Hello [color=red]BBCode injection[/color] (no escaping)!")
    append_chat_line_escaped("Player 2", "Hello [color=red]BBCode injection[/color] (with escaping)!")
# Returns escaped BBCode that won't be parsed by RichTextLabel as tags.
func escape_bbcode(bbcode_text):
    # We only need to replace opening brackets to prevent tags from being parsed.
    return bbcode_text.replace("[", "[lb]")
# Appends the user's message as-is, without escaping. This is dangerous!
func append_chat_line(username, message):
    append_text("%s: [color=green]%s[/color]\n" % [username, message])
# Appends the user's message with escaping.
# Remember to escape both the player name and message contents.
func append_chat_line_escaped(username, message):
    append_text("%s: [color=green]%s[/color]\n" % [escape_bbcode(username), escape_bbcode(message)])

Stripping BBCode tags

For certain use cases, it can be desired to remove BBCode tags from the string. This is useful when displaying the RichTextLabel’s text in another Control that does not support BBCode (such as a tooltip):

extends RichTextLabel
func _ready():
    var regex = RegEx.new()
    regex.compile("\\[.*?\\]")
    var text_without_tags = regex.sub(text, "", true)
    # `text_without_tags` contains the text with all BBCode tags removed.

Note

Removing BBCode tags entirely isn’t advised for user input, as it can modify the displayed text without users understanding why part of their message was removed. Escaping user input should be preferred instead.

Performance

In most cases, you can use BBCode directly as-is since text formatting is rarely a heavy task. However, with particularly large RichTextLabels (such as console logs spanning thousands of lines), you may encounter stuttering during gameplay when the RichTextLabel’s text is updated.

There are several ways to alleviate this:

• Use the append_text() function instead of appending to the text property. This function will only parse BBCode for the added text, rather than parsing BBCode from the entire text property.

• Use push_[tag]() and pop() functions to add tags to RichTextLabel instead of using BBCode.

• Enable the Threading > Threaded property in RichTextLabel. This won’t speed up processing, but it will prevent the main thread from blocking, which avoids stuttering during gameplay. Only enable threading if it’s actually needed in your project, as threading has some overhead.

Using push_[tag]() and pop() functions instead of BBCode

If you don’t want to use BBCode for performance reasons, you can use functions provided by RichTextLabel to create formatting tags without writing BBCode in the text.

Every BBCode tag (including effects) has a push_[tag]() function (where [tag] is the tag’s name). There are also a few convenience functions available, such as push_bold_italics() that combines both push_bold() and push_italics() into a single tag. See the RichTextLabel class reference for a complete list of push_[tag]() functions.

The pop() function is used to end any tag. Since BBCode is a tag stack, using pop() will close the most recently started tags first.

The following script will result in the same visual output as using BBCode [color=green]test [i]example[/i][/color]:

extends RichTextLabel
func _ready():
    append_text("BBCode ")  # Trailing space separates words from each other.
    push_color(Color.GREEN)
    append_text("test ")  # Trailing space separates words from each other.
    push_italics()
    append_text("example")
    pop()  # Ends the tag opened by `push_italics()`.
    pop()  # Ends the tag opened by `push_color()`.

Warning

Do not set the text property directly when using formatting functions. Appending to the text property will erase all modifications made to the RichTextLabel using the append_text(), push_[tag]() and pop() functions.

Reference

Note

Tags for bold ([b]) and italics ([i]) formatting work best if the appropriate custom fonts are set up in the RichTextLabelNode’s theme overrides. If no custom bold or italic fonts are defined, faux bold and italic fonts will be generated by Godot. These fonts rarely look good in comparison to hand-made bold/italic font variants.

The monospaced ([code]) tag only works if a custom font is set up in the RichTextLabel node’s theme overrides. Otherwise, monospaced text will use the regular font.

There are no BBCode tags to control vertical centering of text yet.

Options can be skipped for all tags.

Paragraph options

• align

  Values	left, center, right, fill
  Default	left

  Text horizontal alignment.

• bidi_override, st

  Values	default, uri, file, email, list, none, custom
  Default	default

  Structured text override.

• direction, dir

  Values	ltr, rtl, auto
  Default	Inherit

  Base BiDi direction.

• language, lang

  Values	ISO language codes. See Locale codes
  Default	Inherit

  Locale override.

Handling [url] tag clicks

By default, [url] tags do nothing when clicked. This is to allow flexible use of [url] tags rather than limiting them to opening URLs in a web browser.

To handle clicked [url] tags, connect the RichTextLabel node’s meta_clicked signal to a script function.

For example, the following method can be connected to meta_clicked to open clicked URLs using the user’s default web browser:

# This assumes RichTextLabel's `meta_clicked` signal was connected to
# the function below using the signal connection dialog.
func _richtextlabel_on_meta_clicked(meta):
    # `meta` is not guaranteed to be a String, so convert it to a String
    # to avoid script errors at run-time.
    OS.shell_open(str(meta))

For more advanced use cases, it’s also possible to store JSON in an [url] tag’s option and parse it in the function that handles the meta_clicked signal. For example:

[url={"example": "value"}]JSON[/url]

Image options

• color

  Values	Color name or color in HEX format
  Default	Inherit

  Color tint of the image (modulation).

• height

  Values	Number in pixels
  Default	Inherit

  Target height of the image.

• width

  Values	Number in pixels
  Default	Inherit

  Target width of the image.

• region

  Values	x,y,width,height in pixels
  Default	Inherit

  Region rect of the image. This can be used to display a single image from a spritesheet.

Image vertical alignment

When a vertical alignment value is provided with the [img] tag the image will try to align itself against the surrounding text. Alignment is performed using a vertical point of the image and a vertical point of the text. There are 3 possible points on the image (top, center, and bottom) and 4 possible points on the text (top, center, baseline, and bottom), which can be used in any combination.

To specify both points, use their full or short names as a value of the image tag:

[img=top,bottom]
[img=center,center]

You can also specify just one value (top, center, or bottom) to make use of a corresponding preset (top-top, center-center, and bottom-bottom respectively).

Short names for the values are t (top), c (center), l (baseline), and b (bottom).

Font options

• name, n

  Values	A valid Font resource path.
  Default	Inherit

  Font resource path.

• size, s

  Values	Number in pixels.
  Default	Inherit

  Custom font size.

Named colors

For tags that allow specifying a color by name you can use names of the constants from the built-in Color class. Named classes can be specified in a number of styles using different casings: DARK_RED, DarkRed, and darkred will give the same exact result.

Hexadecimal color codes

For opaque RGB colors, any valid 6-digit hexadecimal code is supported, e.g. [color=#ffffff]white[/color]. Shorthand RGB color codes such as #6f2 (equivalent to #66ff22) are also supported.

For transparent RGB colors, any RGBA 8-digit hexadecimal code can be used, e.g. [color=#ffffff88]translucent white[/color]. Note that the alpha channel is the last component of the color code, not the first one. Short RGBA color codes such as #6f28 (equivalent to #66ff2288) are supported as well.

Cell options

• expand

  Values	Integer number
  Default	1

  Cell expansion ration, which cell will try to expand to proportionally to other cells and their expansion ratios.

• border

  Values	Color name or color in HEX format
  Default	Inherit

  Cell border color.

• bg

  Values	Color name or color in HEX format
  Default	Inherit

  Cell background color. For alternating odd/even row backgrounds you can use bg=odd_color,even_color.

Ordered list types

Ordered lists can be used to automatically mark items with numbers or letters in ascending order. This tag supports the following type options:

• 1 - Numbers, using language specific numbering system if possible.

• a, A - Lower and upper case Latin letters.

• i, I - Lower and upper case Roman numerals.

Text effects

BBCode can also be used to create different text effects that can optionally be animated. Five customizable effects are provided out of the box, and you can easily create your own. By default, animated effects will pause when the SceneTree is paused. You can change this behavior by adjusting the RichTextLabel’s Process > Mode property.

All examples below mention the default values for options in the listed tag format.

Note

Text effects that move characters’ position may result in characters being clipped by the RichTextLabel node bounds.

You can resolve this by disabling Control > Layout > Clip Contents in the inspector after selecting the RichTextLabel node, or ensuring there is enough margin added around the text by using line breaks above and below the line using the effect.

Wave

Wave makes the text go up and down. Its tag format is [wave amp=50.0 freq=5.0 connected=1]{text}[/wave].

amp controls how high and low the effect goes, and freq controls how fast the text goes up and down. A freq value of 0 will result in no visible waves, and negative freq values won’t display any waves either. If connected is 1 (default), glyphs with ligatures will be moved together. If connected is 0, each glyph is moved individually even if they are joined by ligatures. This can work around certain rendering issues with font ligatures.

Tornado

Tornao makes the text move around in a circle. Its tag format is [tornado radius=10.0 freq=1.0 connected=1]{text}[/tornado].

radius is the radius of the circle that controls the offset, freq is how fast the text moves in a circle. A freq value of 0 will pause the animation, while negative freq will play the animation backwards. If connected is 1 (default), glyphs with ligatures will be moved together. If connected is 0, each glyph is moved individually even if they are joined by ligatures. This can work around certain rendering issues with font ligatures.

Shake

Shake makes the text shake. Its tag format is [shake rate=20.0 level=5 connected=1]{text}[/shake].

rate controls how fast the text shakes, level controls how far the text is offset from the origin. If connected is 1 (default), glyphs with ligatures will be moved together. If connected is 0, each glyph is moved individually even if they are joined by ligatures. This can work around certain rendering issues with font ligatures.

Fade

Fade creates a static fade effect that multiplies each character’s opacity. Its tag format is [fade start=4 length=14]{text}[/fade].

start controls the starting position of the falloff relative to where the fade command is inserted, length controls over how many characters should the fade out take place.

Rainbow

Rainbow gives the text a rainbow color that changes over time. Its tag format is [rainbow freq=1.0 sat=0.8 val=0.8]{text}[/rainbow].

freq is the number of full rainbow cycles per second, sat is the saturation of the rainbow, val is the value of the rainbow. A freq value of 0 will pause the animation, while negative freq will play the animation backwards.

Font outlines are not affected by the rainbow effect (they keep their original color). Existing font colors are overridden by the rainbow effect. However, CanvasItem’s Modulate and Self Modulate properties will affect how the rainbow effect looks, as modulation multiplies its final colors.

Custom BBCode tags and text effects

You can extend the RichTextEffect resource type to create your own custom BBCode tags. Create a new script file that extends the RichTextEffect resource type and give the script a class_name so that the effect can be selected in the inspector. Add the @tool annotation to your GDScript file if you wish to have these custom effects run within the editor itself. The RichTextLabel does not need to have a script attached, nor does it need to be running in tool mode. The new effect can be registered in the Inspector by adding it to the Markup > Custom Effects array, or in code with the install_effect() method:

Selecting a custom RichTextEffect after saving a script that extends RichTextEffect with a class_name

Warning

If the custom effect is not registered within the RichTextLabel’s Markup > Custom Effects property, no effect will be visible and the original tag will be left as-is.

There is only one function that you need to extend: _process_custom_fx(char_fx). Optionally, you can also provide a custom BBCode identifier simply by adding a member name bbcode. The code will check the bbcode property automatically or will use the name of the file to determine what the BBCode tag should be.

_process_custom_fx

This is where the logic of each effect takes place and is called once per glyph during the draw phase of text rendering. This passes in a CharFXTransform object, which holds a few variables to control how the associated glyph is rendered:

• identity specifies which custom effect is being processed. You should use that for code flow control.

• outline is true if effect is called for drawing text outline.

• range tells you how far into a given custom effect block you are in as an index.

• elapsed_time is the total amount of time the text effect has been running.

• visible will tell you whether the glyph is visible or not and will also allow you to hide a given portion of text.

• offset is an offset position relative to where the given glyph should render under normal circumstances.

• color is the color of a given glyph.

• glyph_index and font is glyph being drawn and font data resource used to draw it.

• Finally, env is a Dictionary of parameters assigned to a given custom effect. You can use get() with an optional default value to retrieve each parameter, if specified by the user. For example [custom_fx spread=0.5 color=#FFFF00]test[/custom_fx] would have a float spread and Color color parameters in its env Dictionary. See below for more usage examples.

The last thing to note about this function is that it is necessary to return a boolean true value to verify that the effect processed correctly. This way, if there’s a problem with rendering a given glyph, it will back out of rendering custom effects entirely until the user fixes whatever error cropped up in their custom effect logic.

Here are some examples of custom effects:

Ghost

@tool
extends RichTextEffect
class_name RichTextGhost
# Syntax: [ghost freq=5.0 span=10.0][/ghost]
# Define the tag name.
var bbcode = "ghost"
func _process_custom_fx(char_fx):
    # Get parameters, or use the provided default value if missing.
    var speed = char_fx.env.get("freq", 5.0)
    var span = char_fx.env.get("span", 10.0)
    var alpha = sin(char_fx.elapsed_time * speed + (char_fx.range.x / span)) * 0.5 + 0.5
    char_fx.color.a = alpha
    return true

Pulse

@tool
extends RichTextEffect
class_name RichTextPulse
# Syntax: [pulse color=#ffffff33 freq=1.0 ease=-2.0 height=0][/pulse]
# Define the tag name.
var bbcode = "pulse"
func _process_custom_fx(char_fx):
    # Get parameters, or use the provided default value if missing.
    var color = Color(char_fx.env.get("color", Color(1, 1, 1, 0.2)))
    var freq = char_fx.env.get("freq", 1.0)
    var param_ease = char_fx.env.get("ease", -2.0)
    var height = char_fx.env.get("height", 0)
    var sined_time = (ease(pingpong(char_fx.elapsed_time, 1.0 / freq) * freq, param_ease))
    var y_off = sined_time * height
    char_fx.color = char_fx.color.lerp(char_fx.color * color, sined_time)
    char_fx.offset = Vector2(0, -1) * y_off
    return true

Matrix

@tool
extends RichTextEffect
class_name RichTextMatrix
# Syntax: [matrix clean=2.0 dirty=1.0 span=50][/matrix]
# Define the tag name.
var bbcode = "matrix"
# Gets TextServer for retrieving font information.
func get_text_server():
    return TextServerManager.get_primary_interface()
func _process_custom_fx(char_fx):
    # Get parameters, or use the provided default value if missing.
    var clear_time = char_fx.env.get("clean", 2.0)
    var dirty_time = char_fx.env.get("dirty", 1.0)
    var text_span = char_fx.env.get("span", 50)
    var value = char_fx.glyph_index
    var matrix_time = fmod(char_fx.elapsed_time + (char_fx.range.x / float(text_span)), \
                           clear_time + dirty_time)
    matrix_time = 0.0 if matrix_time < clear_time else \
                  (matrix_time - clear_time) / dirty_time
    if matrix_time > 0.0:
        value = int(1 * matrix_time * (126 - 65))
        value %= (126 - 65)
        value += 65
    char_fx.glyph_index = get_text_server().font_get_glyph_index(char_fx.font, 1, value, 0)
    return true

This will add a few new BBCode commands, which can be used like so:

[center][ghost]This is a custom [matrix]effect[/matrix][/ghost] made in
[pulse freq=5.0 height=2.0][pulse color=#00FFAA freq=2.0]GDScript[/pulse][/pulse].[/center]