Kerning

Kerning adjusts the spacing between a specific pair of characters to improve visual balance and readability. It differs from tracking, which changes spacing across a run of text.

Kerning pair: A specific pair of characters whose spacing is adjusted in typography. Kerning operates on pairs such as A and V, rather than uniformly across a word.
Tracking (typography): A uniform adjustment to spacing across a sequence of characters. Tracking affects many adjacent pairs at once, unlike kerning’s targeted adjustments.
Typography: The design and arrangement of written language in visual form. Kerning is one of typography’s tools for controlling the appearance of text.
AV pair: A common uppercase letter pair whose diagonal shapes can leave a conspicuous gap. Reducing the gap between A and V is a classic demonstration of kerning.
Font metrics: Measurements and spacing data that describe glyphs and their placement in a font. Metrics provide the default positions that kerning adjustments refine.
Letter-spacing: A general typographic adjustment to spacing between letters, often applied across text. The term can describe broad spacing changes that are not pair-specific kerning.
Type design: The creation of typefaces, including their letterforms, spacing, and technical behavior. Type designers build kerning values into fonts for recurring visual pairings.
To pair: A lowercase letter pair whose shapes often require close visual spacing. The overhanging top of T can make ordinary spacing above o look too wide.
Glyph: A visual representation of a character or other text element in a typeface. Kerning changes the relative placement of glyphs, not the character identities.
Leading: The vertical distance between successive lines of text. Leading changes line spacing, while kerning changes horizontal spacing within a line.

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