Leading, tracking and measure: the typography settings that make a menu breathe
Line spacing, letterspacing and line length for restaurant menus, with concrete values per text level and the spacing between dishes that separates a menu from a spreadsheet.
Two menus can use the same typeface at the same size and one will feel calm while the other feels like a tax form. The difference is almost always spacing: how far apart the lines sit, how loosely the letters are set, how long each line runs, and how much air separates one dish from the next. Here are the values I use as a starting point on every menu, and the reasons behind each of them, so you can adjust them for your own room and your own card.
Leading: the distance between baselines
Leading (line spacing) is measured from baseline to baseline and expressed either in points or as a percentage of the type size. Word processors default to around 115 to 120 %, which is designed for long paragraphs on a bright page. A menu is not a paragraph. Descriptions are two or three lines, read at a distance, in low light, and they need more air than a novel.
- Descriptions in 9 to 10.5 pt: leading at 130 to 145 %, so 12 to 15 pt. This is the single change that makes most menus feel more expensive.
- Dish names in 11 to 13 pt when they wrap to two lines: 115 to 125 %; a name should read as one unit, tighter than the description below it.
- Section headings in caps: 100 to 110 %; capitals have no descenders, so the usual leading leaves a visible hole.
- Wine lists and other tabular content: 135 to 150 %, because the eye travels horizontally along each line and needs a clear track back.
Typefaces with a large x-height (most modern sans serifs) need the upper end of these ranges; old-style serifs with small x-heights and long extenders already carry built-in space and sit comfortably at the lower end.
Space between items: the leading nobody sets
The most common failure on a menu is not line spacing inside a description but the space between one dish and the next. If the gap between the last line of one description and the name of the next dish is the same as the line spacing inside the description, the eye cannot tell where one item ends. Set that gap to at least 1.5 times the description leading, ideally 2 times: for 10 pt text on 14 pt leading, that means 21 to 28 pt between items.
Between sections, double it again. On an A4 page this discipline usually costs you two to four dishes, which is the best edit most menus can receive.
Tracking: letterspacing that works for and against you
Tracking adjusts the space between all letters of a word uniformly. Designers express it in thousandths of an em; 20 units on a 10 pt type adds 0.2 pt between each letter pair.
Lowercase text should stay close to zero. Adding tracking to lowercase makes words fall apart into letters and slows reading; a negative tracking beyond minus 10 makes round letters touch. The exception is small text: below 8 pt, 5 to 10 units of positive tracking compensates for ink spread and helps the allergen key stay open.
Capitals and small caps are the opposite case. They are drawn to sit next to lowercase, and set together they look cramped. Track section headings in caps at 80 to 150 units; small caps at 50 to 100. The bigger the size, the less tracking you need, because at 24 pt the natural sidebearings already read as space.
Kerning versus tracking
Kerning is the adjustment of specific letter pairs (Ta, Wo, r.). Any good font has built-in kerning tables; make sure your layout software applies them (metric or optical kerning switched on) and do not hand-kern a menu unless the restaurant name has an ugly pair. Word processors often leave kerning off by default, which is why a heading in Word looks worse than the same heading in a layout tool.
Measure: how long a line should run
The measure is the line length. The classic comfort zone for reading is 45 to 75 characters per line; on a menu, where lines are short and read at arm's length, 35 to 60 characters is the sweet spot for descriptions. A description that runs the full width of an A4 page at 10 pt reaches 95 characters, and the eye loses its place on the way back.
This is the real argument for two columns on A4: not to fit more dishes but to keep the measure around 45 to 55 characters. On A5 a single column at 10 pt gives roughly 55 to 65 characters, which works without a second column. Keep the gutter between columns at 8 to 12 mm; anything narrower and the eye jumps across.
Set descriptions flush left with a ragged right. Justified text in short measures produces rivers of white between words; centred text is fine for a name, a heading or a three-line tasting menu, but a centred list of twelve dishes with descriptions is slow to scan because every line starts somewhere else.
Margins and the outer frame
Spacing inside the text is wasted if the block runs to the edge of the card. Keep a minimum of 12 mm of margin on A5 and 15 to 20 mm on A4, plus the 3 mm bleed the printer trims. On a bifold, the inside margin against the fold should be a couple of millimetres larger than the outer margin, because the fold itself swallows visual space and a scored 350 g board never opens perfectly flat.
A guest holding the menu also covers the lower corners with their thumbs. Leaving 20 mm at the bottom is not a luxury, it keeps the last dish readable.
A worked example on A5
- Page: 148 × 210 mm, margins 14 mm, single column, measure about 120 mm.
- Section heading: 13 pt caps, tracked 120, 24 pt space above, 10 pt below.
- Dish name: 11.5 pt semibold, leading 14 pt.
- Description: 9.5 pt regular, leading 13 pt, flush left, two lines maximum.
- Space between dishes: 24 pt; between sections: 40 pt.
- Result: 14 to 16 dishes with descriptions per face, comfortably.
Air is not empty space, it is structure
A guest never says the leading on this menu is 140 %; they say it looks nice, or they frown and ask the server what is good. Every value above exists to make the structure of the card obvious without a single rule or box: this is a section, this is a dish, this is its description, this is the price. Set the spacing right and you will need far less decoration to make the menu look designed.
Menu Atelier's eight styles come with these spacing ratios baked in, so leading, item spacing and margins stay in proportion when you switch from A4 to A5 or from a single sheet to a bifold in one click; you can check the result in 3D before downloading the print-ready PDF.