Text Is Too Small or Cut Off

SpeakerView has two different ways of handling a card that has more text than fits comfortably on screen. Understanding which mode you’re in explains almost every “my text looks wrong” question.

The two overflow modes

Open Settings (gear icon on the home screen) and look for When Text Overflows:

• Auto-Shrink (the default) — SpeakerView shrinks the text on a long card so the entire thing fits on one screen. Your chosen font size (see below) is treated as a maximum; text can shrink smaller than that, down to as small as 14pt, if the card is long.
• Paginate — instead of shrinking, long cards are split into multiple pages at each paragraph break. Each page can still shrink a little if needed, but it won’t go as small as Auto-Shrink would, since there’s more room to spread across pages.

Neither mode ever cuts text off or hides it — one or the other is always applied automatically based on your setting.

“My text is too small to read comfortably on stage”

If a card looks tiny, it’s most likely a long card being shrunk to fit under Auto-Shrink. Two fixes:

1. Switch to Paginate mode in Settings, so that card splits into multiple readable pages instead of shrinking.
2. Split the card yourself by adding a --- separator line partway through it in your original .txt file, turning one long card into two shorter ones. See Formatting Your Speech File.

“My font size looks different than what I set in Settings”

This is expected on long cards in Auto-Shrink mode — the font size you choose in Settings is your preferred/maximum size, not a fixed size. SpeakerView will shrink below it as needed so nothing gets cut off. If you want every card to display at exactly your chosen size, keep your cards short enough that they don’t need shrinking, or switch to Paginate mode and split long cards into shorter ones.

“A page in Paginate mode is still shrunk smaller than I’d like”

This happens when a single paragraph — the unit Paginate mode splits on — is itself still too long to fit one screen at your chosen font size. The fix is to add a blank line in the middle of that paragraph in your original file, breaking it into two paragraphs (and therefore two pages).

Adjusting font size

Font size is adjustable from 14pt up to 60pt via the slider in Settings, with a live preview showing exactly how your text will look at that size. Pick something you’re comfortable reading at arm’s length under stage lighting — many presenters prefer larger sizes (30pt+) even though it means more cards/pages overall.

Related settings

• Settings Reference — every setting explained
• Formatting Your Speech File — how cards and paragraphs are defined