Meaning
Global Styles is the unified design control panel within Site Editor, providing centralized management of typography, colors, layout, and spacing across entire websites.
Definition
Global Styles consolidates site design decisions: color palettes (defining all site colors), typography systems (fonts, sizes, line heights for each element), layout controls (content width, spacing scale), and element-specific styling.
Changes propagate site-wide automatically, ensuring design consistency.
The interface provides: visual color picker, typography controls with live preview, spacing adjustments, and style variations (preset design schemes users can switch between).
Block themes define default Global Styles through the theme.json file, allowing users to customize within established design systems.
Global Styles eliminates the need for custom CSS in many cases; users adjust colors, fonts, and spacing through the visual interface.
This democratizes design control, allowing non-technical users to maintain brand consistency without code knowledge.
Example
A blogger redesigns their site using Global Styles. They select brand colors: primary (#1e40af), secondary (#f59e0b), background (#ffffff), and text (#1f2937).
They configure typography: headings use Montserrat font at responsive sizes, body text uses Inter at 18px with 1.7 line height.
They set the content width to 800px and spacing scale to generate consistent margins/padding.
These Global Style decisions automatically apply across all posts, pages, and templates, transforming the entire site’s appearance from one interface.
