Format paragraphs

You use the Paragraph panel (Window > Type > Paragraph) to change the formatting of columns and paragraphs. When type is selected or when the Type tool is active, you can also use options in the Control panel to format paragraphs.

For a video on working with character and paragraph styles, see www.adobe.com/go/vid0047.

By default, only the most commonly-used options in the Paragraph panel are visible. To show all options, choose Show Options from the panel menu. Alternatively, click the double triangle on the panel’s tab to cycle through the display sizes.

Align text

Area type and type on a path can be aligned with one or both edges of a type path.

Justify text

Text is justified when it is aligned with both edges. You can justify all text in a paragraph either including or excluding the last line.

Adjust word and letterspacing in justified text

You can precisely control how Adobe applications space letters and words and scale characters. Adjusting spacing is especially useful with justified type, although you can also adjust spacing for unjustified type.

Indent text

Indention is the amount of space between text and the boundary of a type object. Indention affects only the selected paragraph or paragraphs, so you can easily set different indentions for different paragraphs.

You can set indents using the Tabs panel, the Control panel, or the Paragraph panel. When working with area type, you can also control indention using tabs or by changing the inset spacing for the type object.

Set indents using the Paragraph panel

Set an indent using the Tabs panel

Create a hanging indent

In a hanging indent, all the lines in a paragraph are indented except for the first line. Hanging indents are especially useful when you want to add inline graphics at the beginning of the paragraph, or when you want to create a bulleted list.

Adjust paragraph spacing

Hanging punctuation

Hanging punctuation makes the edges of text appear more even by moving punctuation marks outside the paragraph margins.

Illustrator provides the following options for hanging punctuation:

Controls the alignment of punctuation marks for a specific paragraph. When Roman Hanging Punctuation is turned on, the following characters appear 100% outside the margins: single quotes, double quotes, hyphens, periods, and commas; the following characters appear 50% outside the margins: asterisks, tildes, ellipses, en dashes, em dashes, colons, semicolons. To apply this setting, insert the cursor in the paragraph and select Roman Hanging Punctuation from the Paragraph panel menu.

Controls the alignment of punctuation marks for all paragraphs within a type object. When Optical Margin Alignment is turned on, roman punctuation marks as well as the edges of letters (such as W and A) hang outside the text margins so that the type looks aligned. To apply this setting, select the type object and choose Type > Optical Margin Alignment.

Controls the alignment of double-byte punctuation marks (available in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean fonts). These punctuation marks are not affected by the Roman Hanging Punctuation option or Optical Margin Alignment option.

Keep in mind that the paragraph alignment determines the margin from which the punctuation hangs. For left-aligned and right-aligned paragraphs, punctuation hangs off the left and right margin, respectively. For top-aligned and bottom-aligned paragraphs, punctuation hangs off the top and bottom margin, respectively. For centered and justified paragraphs, punctuation hangs off both margins.

note: When a punctuation character is followed by a quotation mark, both characters hang.