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A paragraph is more than one line of type.
When you're reading something online or writing a paper, you can see how paragraphs are formed by multiple lines of type.
Paragraphs can be distinguished by indentations, as shown below.
Paragraphs can also be distinguished by the space between the bodies of text.
Back when movable type was used, the negative space between each line of type was called leading.
Again, this referred to non-digital printing since there is no metal or lead between each line of text when you print digitally.
Leading is measured by the ascender height and descender height. Looking at the image below, the ascender height is the maximum height of the character.
The H is a little taller, and the P sets the descender height. Both of those heights are taken into account when setting leading. In this example, you can see how the leading is different in each column and how it really affects the readability.
By default, leading in most page layout software is 20% of the size type, but you can change leading or linespacing to fit your needs.
If you're trying to create a comfortable reading experience, keep ascenders and descenders in mind; you won't want them touching one another or overlapping.
If you look at lines of text in blocks, like in the image below, you can really see the leading or linespacing between each line of text in the negative white space there.
Kerning is the spacing between letter pairs in a headline, often adjusted to make the white space visually even. This is closely related to letterspacing.
In the example of kerning below, you can see that the spacing between the W and the A has a lot of negative space surrounding it up top.
If you auto adjust it, you get something similar to what you see in the middle. If you manually adjust it, then you have a bit more control over the spacing like you do at the bottom. Below is another look at the negative space between letters.
It's a minor adjustment, but kerning really does change the look of headings.
Tracking is the spacing over a range of letters and words in body copy, often adjusted for fit or style.
In the image below, you can see that the spacing changes in each line, but this is different from kerning.
Tracking refers to the overall spacing of a word or line of text, and it affects the overall spacing or density and readability of that particular block of text. Kerning, on the other hand, is specific to spacing adjustments of two particular characters that don't appear equally spaced.
Source: SOURCE: THIS WORK IS ADAPTED FROM SOPHIA AUTHOR MARIO E. HERNANDEZ
