I know that many students out there feel like feels like a small thing, until your supervisor sends your project back over margins that are half an inch off, or a font that is technically fine but not what your department expects. It is one of those areas where getting it right the first time saves you a genuinely annoying round of corrections. Let's go through the standard that most universities actually expect.
Times New Roman at 12 point size is the standard almost every university defaults to for the main body text of a project. Some departments allow Arial as an alternative, but this is far less common, so stick with Times New Roman unless your department's guideline explicitly says otherwise. Headings are sometimes allowed at a slightly larger size, 14 point is common, and often bolded, but check your specific department's template rather than assuming.
The typical standard is a 1.5 inch margin on the left side of the page, to leave room for binding, and 1 inch margins on the top, right, and bottom. This is not universal though, some departments use a full 1.5 inch margin on all four sides, so it is genuinely worth confirming your specific school's requirement rather than assuming it matches what a friend at a different university used.
Double spacing (2.0) is the standard for the main body text of almost every university project, which makes the document easier to read and mark, and also easier to annotate with corrections during supervision. Some sections, like block quotations, table contents, or footnotes, are often single spaced (1.0) even within an otherwise double spaced document, so check your department's specific rules for these exceptions.
Justified alignment, where text lines up evenly on both the left and right margins, is the standard most departments expect for the main body text, since it gives the document a clean and formal appearance. The first line of each new paragraph is usually indented, typically by half an inch, though some departments prefer block paragraphs with a blank line between them instead of indentation, so again, this is worth confirming.
Chapter titles are usually centered, in capital letters, and bolded, often starting on a new page. Section headings within a chapter typically follow a numbered structure, like 2.1, 2.2, and so on, with consistent formatting, size, and boldness across the whole document. Consistency matters more here than any particular style choice, a document where heading styles shift halfway through looks unpolished even if each individual heading looks fine on its own.
Tables are typically numbered by chapter, like Table 4.1, Table 4.2, with the title placed above the table, while figures usually have their title placed below. Keep this consistent throughout your document and reference every table or figure by its number somewhere in your text, rather than just dropping it in with no mention.
Consistent formatting genuinely makes your document easier to mark, and departments notice when a project has clearly been assembled from mismatched templates, different fonts pasted together from different sources, or inconsistent spacing that suggests it was never properly reviewed as a whole. A clean and consistent format signals attention to detail before your panel has even read a single sentence of the actual content.
Mixing fonts or font sizes across different chapters, often from copying and pasting sections written at different times
Using single spacing throughout instead of double spacing for the main body text
Inconsistent margins between chapters
Heading styles that shift partway through the document
Not confirming the department's specific template before formatting the whole project
It's better you get your formatting locked down early, ideally with a proper template applied from chapter one. That will save you from having to go back and manually fix every chapter later. If you want help making sure your project follows your exact department's formatting standard, my team at ProjectPal have handled this as part of every project we work on. Reach out to us on WhatsApp to get started.
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