Centering sections

Question

I would like to use titlesec to center my sections as follows (MWE):

\documentclass[10pt,a4paper,twoside]{book}
\usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage{titlesec}
\titleformat{\section}% command to format the section titles
        [block]% shape/type of title
        {\LARGE\bfseries}% formatting commands applied to both label and title
        {\begin{center} \thesection \end{center}}% section number; here set inside an invisible box with a constant width
        {0em}% separation between number and chapter title; we've already covered this with the box
        {}% additional formatting command for title itself not applied to number
        [
        ]%
\begin{document}
\chapter{The first chapter}
\lipsum[1-5]
\section{First section}
\lipsum[3]
\section*{Section}
\lipsum[4]

\end{document}

But this does not center the title of the section, and it is not very beautiful either. How can I beautifully center sections using titlesec?

Answer 1

It will work if you put \centering along with \LARGE\bfseries as suggested by cfr.

\titleformat{\section}% command to format the section titles
        [block]% shape/type of title
        {\LARGE\bfseries\centering}% formatting commands applied to both label and title
        {\thesection}% section number; here set inside an invisible box with a constant width
        {1ex}% separation between number and chapter title; we've already covered this with the box
        {}% additional formatting command for title itself not applied to number
        [
        ]%

gives

You can also use the simplified format

\titleformat*{\section}{\LARGE\bfseries\centering}

instead of \titleformat.

\documentclass[10pt,a4paper,twoside]{book}
\usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage{titlesec}
%\titleformat{\section}% command to format the section titles
%        [block]% shape/type of title
%        {\LARGE\bfseries\centering}% formatting commands applied to both label and title
%        {\thesection}% section number; here set inside an invisible box with a constant width
%        {1ex}% separation between number and chapter title; we've already covered this with the box
%        {}% additional formatting command for title itself not applied to number
%        [
%        ]%

\titleformat*{\section}{\LARGE\bfseries\centering}
\begin{document}
\chapter{The first chapter}
\lipsum[1-5]
\section{First section}
\lipsum[3]
\section*{Section}
\lipsum[4]

\end{document}

As reminded by Bernard, you can also use \filcenter provided by titlesec instead of \centering.

But it would be easy to use sectsty as in AboAmmar's answer if possible.

Answer 2

A quick solution using the sectsty package

\documentclass[10pt,a4paper,twoside]{book}
\usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
\usepackage{lipsum}
%\usepackage{titlesec}
\usepackage{sectsty}

\allsectionsfont{\centering}

\begin{document}
\chapter{The first chapter}
\lipsum[1-5]
\section{First section}
\lipsum[3]
\section*{Section}
\lipsum[4]

\end{document}

Or, simply using titlesec by adding the [center] option as this:

\documentclass[10pt,a4paper,twoside]{book}
\usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage[center]{titlesec}

\begin{document}
\chapter{The first chapter}
\lipsum[1-5]
\section{First section}
\lipsum[3]
\section*{Section}
\lipsum[4]

\end{document}