tut Pro: Styles

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Adding Styles (.stylx files) to ArcGIS Pro

See also: Add Styles to a Project (Pro Help)
See also: ESRI Style Gallery

A relatively small number of styles (or symbol sets) are installed with ArcGIS Pro. Many more are available online. To use these Styles (collections of marker symbols, line symbols, colors, etc.) they must be added to your project. This is done by downloading a .stylx file. Some stylex files can be searched for and added directly from ArcGIS Pro. Others need to be downloaded and then Added manually to ArcGIS Pro.

Despite the small collection of symbols and colors that are installed by default with ArcGIS Pro, there are lots of Styles available. Those that ESRI creates are grouped and named (somewhat) thematically. For example, here is a sample of the Styles that are available:

  • Civic
  • Crime Analysis
  • Environmental
  • Forestry
  • Geology
  • Hazmat
  • Transportation
  • Utilities
  • etc.

Styles are managed as part of the ArcGIS Pro project. New styles can be added to the project and you can create custom styles of your own. You can also add symbols and colors that you like to your 'Favorites' style.

To View the Styles That are (currently) Available in an ArcGIS Pro Project:

  • Open the Catalog Pane
  • Expand the Styles folder
    • This will show you the Styles already available

To Add a (Basic ESRI) Style to an ArcGIS Pro Project:

(This method works for the basic ESRI styles, which are very similar to what used to be installed with ArcMap...)

  • Open the Catalog Pane
  • At the top of the Catalog Pane, click the Portal tab
  • Under the Portal tab, click the ArcgIS Online sub-tab
  • In the Search box, enter .stylx (to search for .stylx files)
    • You can also search for a specific style if you know the name of it
  • The styles in the above list of examples should be included in the search results, among many others...
  • You can hover over the search results to display a brief description
  • Right-click on a Style you want to add to your project can choose Add Style
    • Once downloaded and added, the symbols from the new Style will be available from the Symbology Pane
  • To verify that the new style was added to the project, click the Project tab at the top of the Catalog pane and Expand the Styles folder

More Styles :

ESRI also has a number of new, custom styles. Some of these can also be search for in the same way as above (via Catalog / Portal / All Portal / Search), however, instead entering "stylx" into the Search box enter "Style" - for some reason this returns a different set of search results...

Some of the same, basic style files are included when you search for 'style', but not all. (Also note that some of the results won't be .stylx files at all, but some are...). Plus there are some others, such as:

  • Antique maps
  • Firefly
  • Watercolor

ESRI also has numerous styles that can be downloaded (some of which don't seem to come up on their Search results, yet). See: https://esri-styles.maps.arcgis.com/ 

Some of these include:

Once downloaded, these will need to be manually Added to your project:

  • Download the .stylx file(s) of your choosing, saving them to a logical folder (or moving them from wherever your computer downloads them to a folder of your choosing)
    • But you probably don't want to just download them to the C:/Users folder - better is to keep them in your Project folder or in a GIS folder, etc.
    • See additional notes on the topic of Relocating Style files below...
  • Open the Catalog Pane
  • At the top of the Catalog Pane, click the Project tab
  • Right-click on the Styles folder and choose Add
  • Browse to the folder where you have stored your .stylx file(s)
    • If you don't see your .stylx file try clicking the Refresh button (or right-click and choose Refresh)
  • Click OK to add the Style to your project
    • Once added, the symbols from the new Style will be available from the Symbology Pane

There are also other sources of Styles that can be downloaded or shared. Essentially any custom style (.stylx) file can be posted, shared, downloaded. See notes on creating your own, custom style file below. 

Relocating a Style File:

IF you use the Search / Add functions from within ArcGIS Pro the .stylx file will be downloaded to your local computer. If you wish to use that style on other computers (i.e., if you want to have a mobile project) you will need to relocate the downloaded .stylx file from the User folder to your project folder.

  • Add a Style to your project by searching Portal and clicking Add (see above)
    • This process will download a .stylx file to your local computer
  • By default, these .stylx files are (probably) stored in the C:\Users folder
  • If desired, you can copy/paste these .stylx files from the C:\Users folder to your project folder (or other desired location)
    • Browse to the C:\Users\<UserName>\Documents\ArcGIS\OnlineStyles folder
    • Copy your downloaded .stylx file(s)
    • Browse to your project folder (or other chosen location)
    • Paste your .stylx file(s)

To Use a .stylx Tile That You Have Relocated:

  • Open the Catalog pane
  • Expand the Styles folder
  • Right-click on the Styles folder and choose Add / Add Style
  • Browse to your .stylx file (wherever you have stored it)
    • If you don't see your .stylx file try clicking the Refresh button (or right-click and choose Refresh)

Creating Your Own Style File:

You can also create your own Style (or stylx) file. By default, when you Save a symbol (using the Save Symbol to Style option from the Symbology options). By default saved symbols are stored in your Favorites style, which is stored (by default) in the C:/Users/<username>/AppData/Roaming/ESRI/ArcGISPro/Favorites.stylx file. Since this is (again) stored in your C:/Users folder this probably isn't where you want to store your symbology. Far better would be to have a MyFavoriteStyles.stylx (or whatever you want to call it) that is stored in your Project folder. To do this:

  • Open the Catalog pane
  • Expand the Styles folder
  • Right-click on the Styles folder and choose New / New Style
  • Browse to the location where you want to save your style
  • Enter a name for your new style
  • Click Save

Then, having created your own style set, you can use it by choosing it (rather than 'Favorites') from the Save Symbol to Style dialog box.