Twenty Twenty-Five: make font-weight more consistent cross-browser for strong elements in body text

[rjnagle]

This bug was identified in a support request here. ​https://wordpress.org/support/topic/strong-bold-does-not-work-on-2025-theme-win-firefox-only/

When I use Rich Text Editor (RTE) to bold a passage inside a P block while using the 2025 theme, the bold text will NEVER render as bold on Firefox 134.0.2 on Windows 11.

Bold renders fine on other Win browsers (Edge, Chrome, DudkDuckGo). Also, on Android, bold renders fine on Android Firefox, Chrome, etc..

I first discovered it when making a personal site. But I have been able to reproduce the bug on many different pages on the same site. Then today I did a fresh install on wordpress.com with 6.71 using a 2025 theme. I made absolutely no customizations to this theme or even the wordpress install.

​https://robertistest.wordpress.com/

Two things to note:

1. If I change the p block to h1 and h3 and use RTE to bold certain words, Win Firefox will render the bolds correctly. This only happens on the p block on Win Firefox.

2. I created a simple static HTML page with the strong tag inside a P tag on a Win Firefox browser. It rendered bold successfully. it's just not doing so on WordPress/2025.

[poena]

I still disagree that this would be a bug with the theme.
On a fresh install of the theme, without custom fonts or template changes, the bold from the rich text display correctly in Firefox. I will submit a screenshot using version 134.0.2 (macOS).

[poena]

Bold using Firefox on macOS

[poena]

Bold, Firefox on Windows

[poena]

Finally, the screenshot of your test site, using Firefox on Windows.

[poena]

Screenshot of the test site, Firefox on Windows 11

[rjnagle]

I see a workaround/solution was posted here. ​https://wordpress.org/support/topic/strong-bold-does-not-work-on-2025-theme-win-firefox-only/#post-18266651

I should mention that on a similar page on another website using the 2023 theme, I don’t have this problem on Firefox at all. So maybe the issue is simply whether the default font for the 2025 theme should apply a more unambiguous bold on the strong tag in the p block.

[sabernhardt]

In Firefox (Windows), the bolder font weight in elements such as paragraphs and list items only increases the weight from 300 to 400. That is not very noticeable for a strong emphasis.

The theme's weight was chosen purposely, but maybe it would be worth defining the font-weight as bold or a numerical value for strong elements in body text.