Persian Fonts for Instagram Stories: A Complete Guide to Professional Text Stories

Text stories are one of the most used tools on any business page: a weekend discount, opening hours on a holiday, a new product arriving, a greeting for an occasion, or a line you want followers to start their day with. Making one looks simple: a few words on a coloured background. But the difference between an ordinary text story and one that gets seen, saved and answered lies in the typography details.

For Persian these details matter even more. Persian script is joined, has many dots and small teeth, runs right to left and mixes with Latin words and numbers. A font that looks lovely in English may show Persian letters disconnected, and spacing that looks stylish in English can break the joins of Persian letters.

This guide starts with choosing a font and moves through text hierarchy, kashida, spacing, colour, backgrounds, safe zones and common layouts. Most of the advice works with any tool. In the last sections we show how to make a text story in a few minutes with Fontino, the Persian story maker in the Admino app, and put it straight into your Instagram story.

Story dimensions and safe zones

An Instagram story is vertical with a 9:16 aspect ratio, and the usual size to design at is 1080 by 1920 pixels. If your image has another ratio, Instagram scales it or adds margins around it, and text placed at the edges may be cut off.

Not all of the story is safe for text either. The top holds the story progress bar and the page's picture and name, and the bottom holds the reply box and buttons. Meta's own guidance for stories recommends keeping roughly 14 percent of the top and bottom free of text, about 250 pixels on a 1920-pixel story. Keep the main text in the middle, and leave room in the design for things Instagram adds itself, such as a link or poll sticker.

Why Persian letters sometimes come apart

You may have seen apps that show Persian text as separate, sometimes reversed letters: «س ل ا م» instead of «سلام». The problem comes from one of two places. Either the font lacks Persian letters and their joining forms, or the app does not shape right-to-left text correctly and puts each letter in its isolated form.

So before thinking about how beautiful a font is, make sure both the font and your tool really support Persian: letters join properly, Persian ی and ک have the right shapes, the half-space works, and numbers and English words inside a sentence keep their place. A simple test is to type a sentence like «می‌خواهم ۳ تا کتاب‌های جدید را ببینم» and see whether it displays correctly.

Kinds of Persian font and what each is for

Persian fonts fall into a few families. Each has a different feel and use, and choosing the right family helps your message more than the individual font does.

Plain fonts

Fonts like Vazirmatn, Estedad, Sahel or Samim are unadorned and very readable. For explanations, price lists, opening hours and any text longer than a few words, these are the first choice. The different weights of one plain font, from thin to heavy, let you build hierarchy without changing font.

Classic and Naskh fonts

Classic fonts are rooted in Naskh script and feel formal, cultural or literary. They suit quotes, poetry, formal greetings and brands with a traditional feel, but are less readable at very small sizes.

Calligraphic fonts

Nastaliq, Ruqaa and other calligraphic scripts have a special beauty and are wonderful for a few large words, such as the name of an occasion or a short line. They are not a good choice for long sentences or for numbers and prices, because they are harder to read at a glance.

Display and headline fonts

Heavy, bold fonts like Lalezar are made for headlines: one large word such as «حراج» (sale) or «جدید» (new) that must be seen from a distance. Use them only for the main word and write the rest in a plain font.

Handwritten and decorative fonts

These fonts feel friendly, playful or artistic and suit more personal stories, cafes, handmade products and informal messages. Use them in moderation; if all the text is decorative, nothing stands out.

Which font for which message

• Sales and discounts: a heavy headline for the percentage or the word «تخفیف», and a plain font for details and the end date.
• New product: a plain, modern font at medium weight, with the product name larger.
• Announcements and opening hours: a plain font only; readability matters more than anything.
• Occasions and greetings: a calligraphic or classic font for the title, and a plain font for the short line below it.
• Quotes and motivational lines: a classic or handwritten font with more line spacing.
• Customer reviews: a plain font for the review and a different or smaller font for the customer's name.

Two fonts at most

An old design rule says not to use more than two fonts in one piece: one for headlines and one for text. A third font rarely adds anything and only makes the story busy. If you need more variety, use different weights or colours of the same font.

Font licences

For business stories, use fonts licensed for commercial use. Many good Persian fonts, such as Vazirmatn and Estedad, are released under the free SIL Open Font License and can be used commercially without worry. Fonts downloaded from unknown sites may not carry such a licence.

Hierarchy: where the eye should land first

A viewer sees a story for a second or two and moves on. In that short time the eye must immediately understand the main message. So every text story needs a starting point: the most important word or number, the largest and boldest part of the screen.

A simple structure that almost always works has three layers: a headline (one or two large words), an explaining line (one line at medium size) and details (date, time or contact at a smaller size). The size difference between these layers should be obvious; if the headline is only slightly bigger than the explanation, the eye does not know where to start.

Besides size, weight, colour and spacing build hierarchy too. One word in a different colour in the middle of a sentence, such as «امروز» (today) or «30%», can do the job of a separate headline.

Kashida: stretching Persian letters

Kashida, also called madd in calligraphy, is stretching the joining stroke between Persian letters: «تخفـــیف» instead of «تخفیف». It is a feature of Persian and Arabic script, and used well it gives a headline a calligraphic feel, emphasis and room to breathe.

Kashida is only possible between letters that join to the next letter; after letters such as «ا», «د», «ر» and «و» it cannot be used. Aesthetically, one kashida per word in the right place usually beats several small ones. Keep kashida for headlines and key words; in normal text it makes reading harder.

There is a technical point too: some fonts do not render kashida well, and the stretched join looks broken or uneven. Look carefully at a stretched headline before publishing.

Spacing: lines, words and letters

Persian has many dots and letters that drop below the line, such as «ی», «ج» and «ع». If line spacing is tight, the dots and tails of one line collide with the next and the text looks crowded and tangled. For multi-line Persian text, use a little more line spacing than you would for English.

Letter spacing in Persian is fundamentally different from English. In English, opening up a headline's letter spacing looks stylish and modern. In Persian, because the letters are joined, opening the spacing either breaks the joins or makes the text look unnatural. If you want a Persian word wider, use kashida rather than letter spacing.

Word spacing matters too. Do not forget the half-space: «می‌شود» and «کتاب‌ها» written with a half-space read as one unit and do not split across a line break.

Colour, contrast and palette

The first colour rule for a text story is readability: the difference in brightness between text and background must be large. White text on light yellow or grey on grey, however pretty, cannot be read on a phone screen in sunlight.

The second rule is limiting colours. One background colour, one colour for the main text and one accent colour for the key word is usually enough. If your brand has a defined colour, make it the accent or background so your stories are recognised as yours at a glance.

Colouring one or two words in a sentence is a simple, effective way to add emphasis: «فقط تا جمعه» (only until Friday) with «جمعه» in the accent colour. But if half the words are coloured, there is no emphasis left.

Outlines, shadows and glow help when text sits on a photo or a busy background. A soft dark shadow under light text, or a thin outline, raises readability without making the design heavy.

Palettes for occasions

The Iranian calendar is full of occasions, each with its own familiar colours: spring green and pink for Nowruz, pomegranate red for Yalda, and calm, dark tones for days of mourning. Using these colours helps the viewer sense a story's mood before reading. Just make sure the occasion's colour does not completely replace your brand's; one brand colour in the headline or logo keeps the story yours.

If you know your brand colours by their colour codes, save them once in your design tool so you do not have to find them again every time. In Fontino, colours you pick with Custom colour stay in My colours.

Backgrounds: solid, gradient, texture or photo

A solid background is the simplest and most readable choice and is great for announcements. A gentle gradient between two similar colours adds depth and a more modern feel without reducing readability.

Textures such as paper, fabric or natural surfaces feel handmade and warm and suit cafes, handmade products and natural brands. Just make sure the texture is not so detailed that it competes with the text.

A photo background needs the most care. Put the text on a calm part of the photo, darken or blur the photo slightly, or set the text on a coloured label or box. If you want to place the text on a photo you choose inside Instagram itself, prepare the text as a transparent PNG or a sticker so it sits on any photo.

Right alignment, mixed text and numbers

Persian text is usually right-aligned or centred. Centring looks better for headlines and short story text; for longer multi-line text, right alignment is easier to read because the eye always starts from the same point.

English words, Latin brand names, phone numbers and website addresses inside a Persian sentence can scramble the word order. After writing, read the sentence right to left and make sure the order is correct. Be consistent with numbers too: all Persian digits or all Latin.

Stickers and decoration

A simple divider, a round badge for a price, a frame around the headline or a few small doodles can turn a text story from a plain screen into a complete design. The rule is that decoration serves the text: it points to the main message, frames it or balances empty space.

If you have a logo or custom icon, using it as a sticker in the corner of your stories helps your brand stay consistent and recognisable. Stickers can go in front of or behind the text; a sticker behind the text must not reduce readability.

Motion in text stories

A story can be a video, and a short motion on the text, such as letters appearing one by one like typing, rising, or glowing, draws attention. Keep motion short and simple: the text should finish appearing quickly and stay still for a few seconds so it can be read. Motion that lasts the whole story or shakes the text makes reading hard.

Common text story layouts

Discounts and sales

Make the discount number the largest element, write «تخفیف» or «حراج» in a headline font, and show the end date clearly but smaller. A specific deadline ("until Thursday") is stronger than a vague one ("for a limited time").

New product

If you have a product photo, make it large and keep the text short: the product name and one key feature. If the story is text only, the word «جدید» in the accent colour is enough to catch attention.

Announcements

Opening hours, closures, a change of address or order shipping times: readability only. A plain font, high contrast and minimal decoration. These stories often stay in Highlights, so make a fitting highlight cover for them too.

Occasions and greetings

For Nowruz, Yalda, holidays or special days, a calligraphic or classic title with a short plain line is the best combination. Avoid the clichés every page posts and write the line in your own brand's voice.

Customer reviews

Write the real customer review in quotation marks with a plain font, colour the word that carries the most value, and put the customer's name or city smaller beneath it. A short review reads better than a long one.

Tips and tutorials, before and after, giveaways

For a tip, write a question as the headline and two or three short lines. For before and after, separate the two parts with a clear divider. For a giveaway, write the conditions as a short numbered list and state when the winner will be announced.

Writing the text itself

Even the best typography cannot rescue long, vague text. A good text story has one message, is written in as few words as possible, and tells the viewer what to do next: send a DM, tap the link, visit the page or buy before the deadline.

If the text is long, spread it across several stories in a row. Each story one part, with the same look, so the viewer feels the story continues.

A simple test for story text is to read it out loud. If it takes more than a few seconds, or has a sentence the message is complete without, shorten it. Keep the tone consistent with your page too: if you talk in a friendly way in DMs and captions, a formal, stiff story feels out of place, and vice versa.

Accessibility

Enough contrast, large sizes and plain fonts improve readability for everyone, but they are essential for people with low vision. Do not put text on busy images, do not rely on colour alone to carry meaning, and give enough time to read; if the story is a video, the text should stay still on screen for a few seconds.

Text size: how large?

On a 1080 by 1920 story, text that looks large in design software on a big monitor is small on a phone. The practical rule is that the headline should be large enough to read at arm's length in one glance, and the smallest text in the story should still be readable without bringing the phone closer. If you have to hold the story to read the details, the text is either too small or too long.

Persian usually needs a slightly larger size than English, because the details of the letters, such as dots and teeth, are finer and fade sooner at small sizes. Do not use thin fonts at small sizes either.

Consistency: stories that build your brand

Followers watch stories one after another at speed. If your stories always share similar fonts, colours and layouts, viewers know a story is from your page even before reading it. That consistency is part of brand identity and builds trust.

Consistency does not mean every story looks the same. It is enough to choose one headline font and one text font, keep two or three brand colours, and have one layout for each kind of message, such as discounts, new products and announcements. Then you change only the text each time. Tools that keep drafts and make it easy to duplicate a design make this very fast.

Story series and Instagram's own stickers

Some messages do not fit in one story: introducing three products, the steps of a tutorial or the details of a festival. Instead of squeezing everything onto one screen, make a series of stories that share one layout and change only their content. A small number like "1 of 3" in the corner of each story tells viewers how much is left.

Text stories can also be combined with Instagram's own stickers: polls, questions, countdowns or links. Instagram adds these after you upload, so leave room for them in the design; for example a discount story with the headline at the top and empty space at the bottom for a link or countdown sticker. If you copy your text as a transparent sticker, you can place it exactly beside Instagram's stickers.

Step by step: making a text story with Fontino

Fontino is the Persian story maker in the Admino app and lives in the Studio section. You do not need a connected Instagram page to design. These steps take a text story from scratch to posting.

1. Install the Admino app: Android from the site's download page and iPhone from Sibapp. Sign up with your mobile number; the first 30 days include every feature free.
2. Go to Studio and open Fontino. Tap New design, or pick one of the ready-made templates.
3. Tap the text and type. To stretch Persian letters, press the kashida button while typing.
4. In the Font tab, choose a font. You can filter by Persian, English and My fonts, mark favourite fonts, or add your own ttf and otf files.
5. In the Style tab, choose a style such as simple, line, box, glass, card, brush, quote, underline, price tag, neon or retro.
6. In the Colour tab, set the text and label colours, and in the layer settings adjust per-word colour, outline, glow, shadow, spacing and rotation.
7. In the Background tab, choose solid, gradient, texture, pattern or a gallery photo, and add stickers if needed.
8. If you want motion, pick one of the motions and its duration in the Animation tab.

With two fingers you can resize and rotate the text or a sticker. The dice tries a fresh font, style and colour at random, which is handy for finding ideas. Undo and redo are always there, and every design saves itself as a draft.

Putting the design into your Instagram story

Fontino has several ways to get a design into a story, each suited to a different job:

• Copy: the designed text is copied as a sticker. In an Instagram story, press and hold the screen and tap Paste to place it on your own photo or video. On Android the share sheet opens so you can send it to Instagram.
• Instagram story: the full story image, with background and stickers, is sent to Instagram.
• Save story: the full image is saved to your gallery; 1080 by 1920 pixels at the default quality.
• Transparent PNG: a story-sized image with no background that sits on any photo.
• Video: if you gave the text a motion, a story-sized MP4 video is made.
• Telegram sticker, and sending the sticker to WhatsApp and other apps.
• Highlight cover: a square image with the text centred in the highlight circle.

You choose the output quality in settings as low, medium, good or best; higher quality gives a larger image and makes copying a little slower. Anything you copy or save also stays in History.

Ready-made templates and AI help

If you do not want to start from a blank page, Fontino has more than 180 ready-made templates in groups such as sales and discounts, new products, announcements, engagement, occasions, greetings, quotes, cafe and food, beauty, fashion, price tags, giveaways, testimonials, tips and before-and-after, in minimal, bold poster, neon, retro, gradient, paper and texture, luxe and playful looks. When you switch template your text is kept and only the look changes.

Fontino's AI section does four things: Write turns a short description into story text, Rewrite makes your current text shorter, punchier, friendlier, more formal, funny, luxurious, urgent or poetic, Design suggests a few ready-made looks for your current text, and Ideas gives ideas for a topic you name. Each request spends one AI credit from your Admino subscription.

If you pair the story with a video, we have also written a separate guide to subtitling that video, covering readability, safe zones and timing for Persian subtitles.

Common mistakes in Persian text stories

• A font that shows Persian letters disconnected.
• Text at the top under the page name, or at the bottom under the reply box.
• More than two fonts in one story.
• Opening up the letter spacing of Persian, which breaks the joins.
• Tight line spacing that piles the dots of lines on top of each other.
• Low contrast between text and background.
• Kashida on every word, or kashida in a font that does not render it well.
• Long text squeezed into one story with no time to read it.
• No call to action: the viewer does not know what to do after seeing the story.
• Using a font that is not licensed for commercial use.

Pre-publish checklist

• Look at the story on a phone at its real size.
• Make sure the main message is understood at a glance.
• The text is in the safe zone and not under the page name or reply box.
• Persian letters join properly and half-spaces are right.
• Re-read numbers, prices and dates.
• You have a clear call to action: a DM, a link or a deadline.
• If the story will stay in Highlights, the highlight cover is ready too.

Conclusion

A professional text story comes from a few simple decisions: a Persian font that joins properly and suits the message, hierarchy that leads the eye to the main word, spacing that gives Persian script room, colour that keeps it readable, and a safe place on the screen. These rules work with any tool.

If you want to do all of it on your phone without design software, Fontino in the Admino app is built for it: more than 120 font families including over 50 Persian fonts, kashida, more than 180 ready-made templates, animation and outputs that go straight into your Instagram story.