Glitch effects dominate modern design. From music posters to tech branding, that fragmented digital aesthetic catches eyes instantly.
Creating authentic glitch typography seems complex. Most designers rely on Photoshop filters or pre-made templates. But those approaches lack control and flexibility.
Here’s the truth: Building glitch text in Illustrator gives you complete creative freedom. Plus, everything stays vector. That means infinite scaling without quality loss.
Let me show you how to slice, shift, and layer your way to professional glitch text that actually looks realistic.
Start With Your Document Setup
Create a new Illustrator document at 1920×1080 pixels. This gives you plenty of room to work.
First, build your background. Grab the Rectangle tool and draw a shape covering the entire artboard. Remove the stroke completely.
Fill this rectangle with a dark gradient. I used teal fading to black. Then switch to the Gradient tool and change it to radial style.
Adjust the gradient center until you get a subtle spotlight effect. This creates depth without overwhelming your text later.
Align the rectangle to the artboard center. Lock that layer immediately so you don’t accidentally select it while working.
Choose Typography That Works
Sans-serif fonts work best for glitch effects. Bold, heavy typefaces create stronger visual impact.
I tested two fonts from Adobe Fonts: Kallisto Heavy and Forma Black Italic. Forma Black Italic won because its weight and slant added extra energy.
Set your text at 275pt and fill it with 95% gray (#f3f3f3). This light color lets the glitch effects pop against the dark background.
Right-click your text and convert to outlines. This transforms live text into editable shapes. You need this for the slicing technique coming next.
Slice Your Text Into Layers
Here’s where things get interesting. Grab the Pen tool and draw four straight lines across your text.
Hold Shift while drawing to keep lines perfectly horizontal. Hit Enter after each line to start fresh. This prevents Illustrator from connecting your lines.
Now drag a selection over everything—text and lines together. Open the Pathfinder panel and click “Divide.”
Nothing seems to happen. Don’t panic. Select your text and go to Object > Ungroup. Check your Layers panel. You’ll see multiple Path layers where one text object used to exist.
Those four lines just sliced your text into five separate pieces.
Group Each Text Slice
Use the Selection tool to grab just the bottom text pieces. Press Cmd/Ctrl + G to group them together.
Lock this group in the Layers panel. Repeat for each text layer moving upward.
You now have five groups representing five horizontal slices of your original text. This separation creates the foundation for realistic glitching.
Select different slices and shift them left or right. Stagger these movements. Random offsets look more authentic than uniform shifts.
Build the Color Glitch Effect
Select all your text groups and group them again into one master group. With this selected, go to Effect > Distort & Transform > Transform.
Set horizontal movement to +10 pixels and make 1 copy. Hit OK.
Go to Object > Expand Appearance, then Object > Ungroup. Check your Layers panel. The bottom group is your shifted copy.
Fill this new group with magenta (#e50083). This creates the classic chromatic aberration look.
Repeat the transform process, but this time move -10 pixels horizontally. Again, expand and ungroup.
Fill this left-shifted copy with cyan (#07ede6). You now have three text layers: white center, magenta right, cyan left.
Add Glitch Artifacts
Glitch effects need those signature horizontal streaks. Grab the Rectangle tool and click once to create a 40×4 pixel rectangle.
Fill it white. Hold Alt/Opt and drag copies around your text. Place these streaks where letter edges meet or overlap.
Lock your three text layers. Select all white rectangles and group them together.
Create two more rectangles, each 40×2 pixels. Fill one with magenta, one with cyan. Duplicate these around your text edges.
Group the cyan shapes separately from magenta shapes. Drag the cyan group just above the cyan text layer. Leave magenta shapes on top of everything.
This layering creates visual depth. Some glitches appear in front, others behind.
Add Realistic Glow Effects
Lock everything except your white center text. Select it and press Cmd/Ctrl + C to copy.
Lock the original. Press Cmd/Ctrl + F to paste in front.
Fill this copy with cyan. Go to Effect > Blur > Gaussian Blur and set it to 75 pixels.
Change the blend mode to Overlay. This creates a soft cyan glow emanating from your text.
Duplicate this blurred layer. Fill the copy with magenta and drag it below all other text layers. Set blend mode to Color Dodge.
Duplicate the cyan blur one more time. Set this to Soft Light blend mode and position it just below the first cyan glow layer.
These three glows add dimension and intensity without overwhelming your design.
Create Scan Line Texture
The finishing touch: scan lines that mimic old CRT monitors. Grab the Rectangle tool and create a 1920×5 pixel shape.
Fill it black and align it to the top center of your artboard. Duplicate this rectangle to the bottom center.
Go to Object > Blend > Blend Options. Choose “Specified Steps” and enter 90.
Select both rectangles and go to Object > Blend > Make. Illustrator creates 90 evenly-spaced lines between them.
Set this blend group to Overlay blend mode at 10-15% opacity. The scan lines add subtle texture without dominating your design.
Fine-Tune Your Final Effect
Now you can tweak everything. Adjust background gradient intensity to change how glows appear.
Shift individual text slices more or less for different glitch intensities. Add or remove artifact rectangles until the balance feels right.
Play with blur amounts on the glow layers. More blur creates softer, dreamier effects. Less blur makes glitches feel sharper and more aggressive.
The beauty of this vector approach? Everything remains editable. Change text, adjust colors, resize infinitely—your glitch effect scales perfectly every time.
Most designers don’t realize how much control Illustrator gives you for effects like this. Photoshop gets all the attention for digital distortion. But vectors win for flexibility and professional output.
Your glitch text is ready to impress clients, dominate portfolios, or elevate your next design project. Plus, you built it from scratch with complete understanding of every layer and effect.