HOW TO FORMAT A LAB REPORT

Formatting is the difference between a report that gets read and a report that gets skimmed. The content might be correct, but a poorly formatted submission signals carelessness — and evaluators grade against rubrics that explicitly reward presentation.

This page is the format-only companion to our full writing guide. If you want the section-by-section content walkthrough, see the complete guide. Below is every formatting rule that consistently earns full marks.

Page Layout

• ▸Paper size: A4 (most Indian universities) or US Letter (US universities)
• ▸Margins: 1 inch on all four sides (2.54 cm)
• ▸Orientation: Portrait only, even for wide code blocks
• ▸Page numbers: bottom-center, starting from the cover page or page 2

Fonts

Use one font family for prose and a different monospaced font for code. The most universally accepted combination:

• ▸Body text: Times New Roman, 12pt
• ▸Code: Consolas or Courier New, 10pt
• ▸Section headings: Times New Roman, 14pt, bold
• ▸Title (cover page): Times New Roman, 18pt, bold

The Cover Page

Most universities require a cover page on every lab report. The fields, in order, top to bottom:

1. 1University name and logo (centered, top of page)
2. 2Department (e.g. "Department of Computer Science")
3. 3Course name and code (e.g. "Data Structures — CSL201")
4. 4Experiment number and title (e.g. "Experiment 4: Stack Implementation")
5. 5Your name, roll number, section
6. 6Submission date
7. 7Faculty name

Section Heading Style

Section headings should be visually distinct from body text. Three rules:

• ▸Bold, 14pt, left-aligned (most common)
• ▸Numbered sequentially (1. Aim, 2. Theory, 3. Algorithm, ...)
• ▸Leave one blank line before and after each heading

Code Block Formatting

Code blocks deserve special treatment. The rules below are universal:

• ▸Wrap code in a single-column, full-width block (no narrow newspaper-style columns)
• ▸Use a monospaced font, 9-10pt
• ▸Preserve indentation — do not let the editor collapse spaces
• ▸Use a light gray background or thin border to separate the block from prose
• ▸For long listings, use a smaller font (8-9pt) rather than letting code spill across pages

Screenshots and Output

Screenshots should be centered, captioned, and not stretched. Caption format: "Figure 1: Output of the stack program with 5 push operations". Do not paste screenshots at full screen resolution — resize to fit the page width with a small margin.

Page Numbers and Headers

Every page after the cover should have:

• ▸Header (top-right): Your name, roll number, page number
• ▸Footer (bottom-center): Page number, sometimes the experiment number
• ▸First page of the content is usually page 1, not page 2

The Submission Checklist

1. 1Cover page complete with all required fields
2. 2All six sections present, in the correct order
3. 3Margins and font sizes match your lab manual
4. 4Code is in a monospaced font, indented consistently
5. 5Output is a real screenshot of the program running, not the source
6. 6Conclusion is 2-3 specific sentences, not generic
7. 7Page numbers and headers present on every page
8. 8Spelling and grammar checked (use Grammarly or your editor's spell check)