In typography, letter-spacing, also called tracking, refers to the amount of space between a group of letters to affect density in a line or block of text.
Letter-spacing can be confused with kerning. Letter-spacing refers to the overall spacing of a word or block of text affecting its overall density and texture. Kerning is a term applied specifically to the spacing adjustment of two particular characters to correct for visually uneven spacing. Kerning adjusts the letters closer together (negative spacing), tracking adjusts the letters further apart (positive spacing).
Letter-spacing adjustments are frequently used in news design. The speed with which pages must be built on deadline does not usually leave time to rewrite paragraphs that end in split words or that create orphans or widows. Letter-spacing is increased or decreased by modest (usually unnoticeable) amounts to fix these unattractive situations.
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Personal computer based applications including Microsoft Word, Adobe Illustrator, QuarkXPress, Adobe InDesign, Adobe Photoshop, and Wordperfect, use differing, non-standard systems of adding or subtracting letter-spacing. What is common to most systems is that the default setting of letter-spacing or tracking is tight in comparison to handset letterpress or cast metal type. In the days of machine-implemented lead typesetting (c.f. Linotype, Monotype), the amount of added spacing always had to be the same between each character which leads to an absolute tracking system still in use in QuarkXpress. In the competing Adobe layout software product InDesign the spacing adjustment is measured in percentage instead. In QuarkXPress a letter-space/tracking setting of 3 opens text measurably, and a setting of 5 begins to take on the appearance of metal type. However in the competing Adobe layout software product InDesign, a letter-space/tracking setting of 3% would be barely noticeable.
The amount of letter-spacing in text can affect legibility. Tight letter-spacing, particularly in small text sizes, can diminish legibility. The addition of minimal letter-spacing can often increase the legibility and readability. Added whitespace around the characters allows the individual characters to emerge and be recognized more quickly. (However, addition of space to the point that individual letters become isolated rather than simply easily identifiable destroys legibility and readability. Words are often identified by their shape as well as by the individual letters.) As reading with phonetic writing systems is based in part on word shape recognition, part on context, and with unfamiliar words, on phonetic pronunciation, recognition of individual characters can be aided by slightly increased letter-spacing.
Letter-spacing may also refer to the insertion of a fixed space. This is a more mechanical method which relies less upon spacing and kerning tables resident in each typeface and accessed and used when letterspacing is applied universally. Fixed spaces include a wordspace, en-space, and em-space. An en-space and em-space measure approximately the width of an uppercase character N or M in the typeface being used. Fixed spaces are sometimes inserted between capitals and small capitals.
The amount of letter-spacing can affect how text is perceived. Tight default letter-spacing, or minus letter-spacing, in text not only can reduce the legibility and readability of text, it can trigger a cultural association that tight letter-spacing is associated with advertising and therefore more subjective – the equivalent of a fast-talking car salesman. Conversely, the increase of letter-spacing in text (to an extent) increases legibility, and the cultural association is of a more objective typographic voice.
"Wide tracking" of text, beyond relaxed book composition, can look affected and earned the opprobrium of Frederic Goudy:
| “ | Anyone who would letter space lower case would steal sheep.[1] | ” |
Until the advent of phototypesetting, the term "letterspacing" referred strictly to the adding of space between the individual letters of words set in metal type, in increments of a minimum of ½ point.
Letterspacing as such was expensive, involving the hand insertion of copper (½ pt.), brass (1 pt.), and printer's "lead" (2 pt.) spaces between individual pieces of type or between matrices on linecasting machines such as the Ludlow Typograph and the Linotype. As such, it was studiously avoided by compositors, as adding nothing more than time to an already laborious task.
The only exceptions were in advertising type or, in book work, in very short phrases in capitals or small capitals, to keep the phrases from being too visually black compared to the rest of the typographic composition.
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