Blurred gradient text outline in Photoshop

Published on July 11, 2023

Create a blurry gradient text outline

In this blog I’ll show you how to create a blurred gradient text outline in Adobe Photoshop.

Rather watch the video with instructions? Then click here to open the video or scroll down to the end of this page.

Step 1: Create text

First create a new file with a white background. My file is 1920 x 1080 pixels. You can use a different file size, but then you may have to use different settings later on.

Then select the horizontal type tool. Make the text color black and pick a font. Then type your text.

Click on the ✓ icon when you’re done with the text.

Press CTRL+T to activate free transform. You can now resize and/or move the text.

Step 2: Blur text

Navigate to ‘Filter > Blur > Gaussian blur‘. If you get a notification, select ‘convert to smart object‘.

I use a radius of 15 pixels.

Step 3: Gradient text outline

Create a gradient map layer.

Click on the gradient to adjust it. Pick a preset or create your own gradient.

I have created my own gradient, you can see that in the image below. The color on the left will be the color of the text. The color on the right becomes the background color.

You can change the way the outline looks by adjusting the gaussian blur. To do that, double click on the ‘gaussian blur’ layer. Then adjust the amount of pixels. I keep the amount at 15 pixels.

And that’s how you create this blurred gradient text outline in Adobe Photoshop!