Get the Text Frame to Resize as I Type?

Type has to be applied in a text frame, and sometimes not all of your type will fit in the frame you’ve created. You then have to spend time resizing the text frame as you work. But there’s a really cool trick to get around this issue, and when I showed it at Photoshop World, everyone went “whoa!” (even Scott Kelby!). It has been right there in InDesign all this time! To make the text frame resize automatically as you add text, just go to Object > Text Frame Options. In the Text Frame Options dialog click on the Auto-Size tab, and then select Height Only from the Auto-Sizing popup menu. In the square box below, select the top-middle option (the little arrow pointing downward). This means the text will always start at the top of the frame and work down. Click OK, and now your text box will resize as you type. To ensure this happens every time, apply this setting before you create your document (with no documents open), and it will become the default for that document every time you create a text frame. Play around with some of the other settings here too—you may find another useful default for placing your text.