Line height

Line height, also called leading, is the vertical distance from one line of text to the next, measured from baseline to baseline. The example compares tight and comfortable spacing.

Too little line height makes text feel cramped; too much makes it hard for the eye to find the next line. For body text, around 1.4 to 1.6 times the font size is a good starting point.

Headlines usually need less, around 1.1 to 1.3, because their lines are short and large. In CSS, a unitless value such as line-height: 1.5 scales with the font size.