word-spacing

Baseline Widely available

This feature is well established and works across many devices and browser versions. It’s been available across browsers since July 2015.

The word-spacing CSS property sets the length of space between words and between tags.

Try it

word-spacing: normal;

word-spacing: 1rem;

word-spacing: 4px;

word-spacing: -0.4ch;


  
    As much mud in the streets as if the waters had but newly retired from the
    face of the earth, and it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus,
    forty feet long or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill.

@font-face {
  src: url("/shared-assets/fonts/variable-fonts/AmstelvarAlpha-VF.ttf");
  font-family: Amstelvar;
  font-style: normal;
}

section {
  font-size: 1.2em;
  font-family: Amstelvar;
}

Syntax

css

/* Keyword value */
word-spacing: normal;

/*  values */
word-spacing: 3px;
word-spacing: 0.3em;

/* Global values */
word-spacing: inherit;
word-spacing: initial;
word-spacing: revert;
word-spacing: revert-layer;
word-spacing: unset;

Values

normal: The normal inter-word spacing, as defined by the current font and/or the browser.
: Specifies extra spacing in addition to the intrinsic inter-word spacing defined by the font.

A large positive or negative word-spacing value will make the sentences the styling is applied to unreadable. For text styled with a very large positive value, the words will be so far apart that it will no longer appear to be a sentence. For text styled with a large negative value, the words will overlap each other to the point where the beginning and end of each word is unrecognizable.

Legible word-spacing must be determined on a case-by-case basis, as different font families have different character widths. There is no one value that can ensure all font families automatically maintain their legibility.

Examples

HTML

html

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.

CSS

css

#mozdiv1 {
  word-spacing: 15px;
}

#mozdiv2 {
  word-spacing: 5em;
}

Formal definition

Initial value	`normal`
Applies to	all elements. It also applies to `::first-letter` and `::first-line`.
Inherited	yes
Percentages	refer to the width of the affected glyph
Computed value	absolute
Animation type	a length

Formal syntax

word-spacing = 
  normal    |

Specifications

Specification
CSS Text Module Level 3 # word-spacing-property
Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) 2 # WordSpacingProperty