letter-spacing

The letter-spacing CSS property specifies the spacing behavior between text characters.

/* <length> values */
letter-spacing: 0.3em;
letter-spacing: 3px;
letter-spacing: .3px;
/* Keyword values */
letter-spacing: normal;
/* Global values */
letter-spacing: inherit;
letter-spacing: initial;
letter-spacing: unset;

Initial value	`normal`
Applies to	all elements. It also applies to `::first-letter` and `::first-line`.
Inherited	yes
Media	visual
Computed value	an optimum value consisting of either an absolute length or the keyword `normal`
Animation type	a length
Canonical order	the unique non-ambiguous order defined by the formal grammar

Syntax

Values

normal: The normal letter spacing for the current font. Unlike a value of 0, this value allows the user agent to alter the space between characters in order to justify text.
<length>: Specifies extra inter-character space in addition to the default space between characters. Values may be negative, but there may be implementation-specific limits. User agents may not further increase or decrease the inter-character space in order to justify text.

Formal syntax

normal | <length>

Examples

HTML

<p class="first-example"> letter spacing </p>
<p class="second-example"> letter spacing </p>
<p class="third-example"> letter spacing </p>
<p class="fourth-example"> letter spacing </p>

CSS

.first-example  { letter-spacing: 0.4em; }
.second-example { letter-spacing: 1em; }
.third-example  { letter-spacing: -0.05em; }
.fourth-example { letter-spacing: 6px; }

Specifications

Specification	Status	Comment
CSS Text Module Level 3 The definition of 'letter-spacing' in that specification.	Working Draft	No change.
CSS Transitions The definition of 'letter-spacing' in that specification.	Working Draft	Defines `letter-spacing` as animatable.
CSS Level 2 (Revision 1) The definition of 'letter-spacing' in that specification.	Recommendation	No change.
Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) 1.1 (Second Edition) The definition of 'letter-spacing' in that specification.	Recommendation	Initial SVG definition.
CSS Level 1 The definition of 'letter-spacing' in that specification.	Recommendation	Initial definition.

Feature	Chrome	Edge	Firefox (Gecko)	Internet Explorer	Opera	Safari (WebKit)
HTML support	1.0	(Yes)	1.0 (1.7 or earlier)	4.0	3.5	1.0 (85)
SVG support	(Yes)	?	No support (bug 371787)	?	(Yes)	(Yes)

Feature	Android	Edge	Firefox Mobile (Gecko)	IE Mobile	Opera Mobile	Safari Mobile
HTML support	?	(Yes)	?	?	?	?
SVG support	?	?	?	?	?	?

Syntax

Values

Formal syntax

Examples

HTML

CSS

Specifications

Browser compatibility

See also

Document Tags and Contributors