Cursed Text (Zalgo) Explained: How Glitchy Unicode Works

Cursed text, also called zalgo text, looks glitchy and creepy, but it is just Unicode.

How it works

Normal letters are followed by many combining characters that draw marks above, below and through them. Because they are real characters, the effect survives copy and paste. A cursed text generator adds the marks and lets you control the intensity.

Caveats

• Heavy zalgo overlaps lines and breaks layouts.
• Screen readers may read it poorly, so keep important text plain.
• Some apps strip combining characters.

Cleaner alternatives

• Cursive italic text for a stylish slant.
• Cursive calligraphy text for a formal look.

More styles on the cursive font generator.