Justification is the alignment of a text with both the left and right edges of the column, achieved by adjusting the space between words line by line. In traditional typography, the term also refers to the length of the line itself.
Where to see it
Justification can be seen in most books and newspapers, where the text forms a clean block on both sides. Poorly handled, especially in narrow columns, it creates rivers, those streaks of white space that wind vertically through the text when word spaces stretch too much.
Why this detail matters
Justification gives the page an orderly look, provided it is well set:
- It produces clean, even text blocks that give a book or newspaper page a sense of calm and rigor;
- It varies the space between words: without hyphenation or in a column that is too narrow, these spaces become uneven and disrupt reading;
- On the web, where hyphenation is handled less well, left alignment is often preferred to keep spacing consistent.
Related term
Hyphenation breaks words at the end of a line and helps justification keep the space between words even.