Grammar how many spaces after a period

Thou shalt place two spaces after a period. Semper Fidelis. Status quo. How many spaces do you leave after a colon in a manuscript? One space after a colon. There is a traditional American typing practice, favored by some, of leaving two spaces after colons and periods.

This practice is discouraged by the University of Chicago Press, especially for formally published works and the manuscripts from which they are published. Please help. I have confusion regarding the correct spacing after periods and other closing punctuation. My company uses the font Arial and consistently uses a flush-left margin. We are an engineering company. My job consists in preparing documents and letters for customers. Everything I read in manuals and from technical writers directs me to use one space after periods.

I find that it works very well, except occasionally, when an extra space helps readability. Knowledgeable engineers have embraced the one space use as being consistent with the font design and automation of reports.

Others are unpleased with the one space, they think they have difficulty reading. I, too, had an adjustment period which I forced myself to endure until it became automatic to read easily. We are preparing technical information. What do you think? Thanks for your wonderful support and especially the quick answers. I greatly appreciate your service.

Published work these days rarely features two spaces after a period. In the era when type was set by hand, it was common to use extra space sometimes quite a bit of it after periods, a practice that continued into the first half of the twentieth century.

The use of single vs. I single space after punctuation. PleaseAWomanIn5Words pic. Double-spacing after every period used to be standard.

Before computers and word processors were prevalent , most people relied on typewriters. Once considered an advanced form of technology themselves, older typewriters were known to produce uneven or unpredictable line spacing. A double space between the end of one sentence and the beginning of another helped to create some uniformity on the page, and made typed pages easier to read.

As technology evolved, the use of a double space to create the appearance of more even typeface declined, and many media outlets stopped using it altogether. Monospaced Fonts and Proportional Fonts The story of spaces after periods is often told as though monospaced typewriter fonts needed two spaces after a sentence for good readability, and that the wide availability of proportional fonts on computers led to the switch to one space.

In monospaced fonts, the letters are all the same width, so an i is the same width as an m , but in proportional fonts the letters are different widths, so an i is much narrower than an m. Her popular LinkedIn Learning courses help people write better to communicate better.

Jump to Navigation. Two Spaces After a Period. By Mignon Fogarty Grammar Girl. May 8, We are currently experiencing playback issues on Safari. If you would like to listen to the audio, please use Google Chrome or Firefox.