What are the main reasons for using full justification when ragged right is more readable?

Question

Most books and magazine articles are printed with full justification, namely with both left and right justification, even though it is generally accepted that the most readable of the justification options is justification on the left only, with the right margin ragged.

(When I looked for some sources for this, I couldn't find a single one that says otherwise. The accepted view is that we find it easier to keep our place in a text when there is a rag on the right, as compared with when the lines of type all end at the same distance across the page, and that consequently text is more readable for us in the first format than in the second.)

So what are the advantages of using full justification?

Answer 1

The main argument I always hear (I work with scientists, and they say it a lot), is that it looks better at first glance*. For a lot of people, the ragged edge looks disorderly and chaotic. On a first superficial look, having two straight margins to your text seems very neat and ordered.

Also, again especially in science, there is inertia. 'This has always been the way we have done things' is a ridiculously strong force, and just about every big publication in science justifies their body texts.

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* This apparently subjective qualification is—thank you curious in the comments—well-explained with Gestalt psychology. The justified 'block' of text is a simpler shape and thus looks like it's easier to make sense of than a way more complex-looking ragged-edge piece of text.

Answer 2

Justification isn't the only way to make text readable.

Line length and leading impact readability a whole lot more than justification. A reasonable paragraph length and indentation can also give you much of the effect of ragged right margins. What ragged right margins gives you is a "silhouette" to navigate by, but paragraphs with indented first lines will give you a similar visual aid and if the line is too long or the lines are to tight, the ragged right margin is not going to help a whole lot.

So full justification can make your text a bit less readable, but proper settings otherwise can offset that. On the other hand, full justification creates a more ordered and enticing text to read. It clearly outlines boundaries and makes the product look neater.

Websites often have ragged right margins, but for more reasons than just readability. First, HTML and CSS lack options for easy type setting. Programs such as InDesign can balance kerning, font width, spaces and word breaks to create a nice looking full justification, but CSS is much more crude and cannot. Also, a website must be assumed to be of adjustable width. When adjusting the width of a text with full justification, the text will jump around and look messy for a while. It may seem like a small thing, but it's a consideration that is made when making websites.

Layout is often a balance between looks and readability. Font choice, margin size, aspect ratio and so on are all part of that. On the whole, justification is a large part of the looks, but only a small part of the readability.

Answer 3

To me, in some cases fully justified text looks aesthetically better to me. That way, it fits better with adjacent stuff or paragraphs. I've tried to show it using following example:

Answer 4

Good question and I'm always puzzled myself by how many clients just need to see justified text "out of habit" or because "it looks better".

I think this depends a lot on the type of content you're working with. For large text volume content (books and magazines), full justification makes more sense, as that allows for a quicker reading experience, less likely to get lost between lines of text, also better definition of columns, when columns are involved, better usage of whitespace and possible reduction in page count (potentially less paper being used, especially when hyphenation also comes into play).

For low volume work however, brochures, flyers, presentations and even web work, when you're working with smaller sections of text, narrow columns, sometimes just paragraphs a few lines long, and especially when more "page decoration" is involved, full justification can range between not functional, to pure ugliness.

Answer 5

Hyphenation, and then paper sheet economy

With hyphenation, you can fit more letters per line than without it. More letters per line means less lines, and then less paper used to print the same text.

You will see full justification text where there is (or, was) a history of economy scale on printing: bibles, journals, magazines...

With aggressive hyphenation, the ragged right margin almost disappear, and so the aid this provides.

The artificial hyphens are ugly, but less is a text with justification. And so you arrives if a justification for full justification.

Answer 6

This is a late response here. But let me explore a bit some of the initial arguments.

It is generally accepted that the most readable of the justification options is justification on the left only, with the right margin ragged.

I do not know if there is an actual modern study about this. It could be interesting.

The left alignment was certainly easier to compose in the pre-digital era and most of the history of printed text for sure. The reason is clear. You needed to add a spacer of a designated width. Nowadays the spacing can be easily distributed.

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But let me explore two reasons why the fixed spacing is more readable.

• The first one is that the eye is not interrupted by weird jumps between words, so the rhythm is steady.

• And the second is that our memory makes a visual reference to the silhouette of the paragraph, like recognizing a "landscape".

But how important these two elements are in a text depends on more factors than alignment. The ones that pop into my mind are.

• How wide, in terms of characters or words, the paragraph is.
• How many lines each paragraph has.
• Spacing between paragraphs.
• Special line design, like first-line indents.
• Text longitude.
• Font design.
• Font size.
• Kerning and spacing design.
• Color and contrast.
• Printed materials and finishes.
• Overall design.
• Language.
• Reading habits.
• Interest of the reader to actually read the text.

When you have many elements at your disposal to make a text interesting and pull the most important element of the list to the top. (The last element of my list) then aesthetics have a predominant role.

I could assume that justified alignment is more predominant in smaller texts, like magazines or blogs, rather than in longer texts like books or papers.

Do not underestimate the power of aesthetics over readability.

Answer 7

It's primarily a quantity over quality decision. Make it fit.

Aesthetics aside and all other parameters being equal, fully-justified text columns results in a higher 'words per page' count than ragged-left or ragged-right text columns. This is in print media. In digital media, where the parameters are more fluid, it may still result with more words per a given viewing screen area and/or less scrolling.

Answer 8

For me, it always comes back to, "Which is easier to read?" and the fact that the vote is overwhelming for left justification. True enough, you can pack more text in a page with full justification and that fact will argue for the latter for as long as books printed on paper are popular. I once owned literally thousands of books printed on paper and now own about a dozen of them along with tens of thousands of ebooks and have access to millions more on the internet. I look forward to the day when full justification has gone the way of the wax tablet and stylus.

Answer 9

In the case of books, magazines with and without columns, full justification, with hyphenation, is standard. And there, hyphenation is the key. Otherwise, no additional characters are gained - they are just spaced out more. This works well in magazines and newspapers with relatively small type and columns and in books which either have columns (for larger ones) or small pages. Paperbacks in particular are relatively tiny pages. In these cases, ragged edges look bad and hyphenation adds more content and helps avoid "rivers" in full-just settings.

But in the case of professional letters, contracts, legal pleadings (unless there are columns) - basically 8-1/2 inch paper - the even spacing of left justification is easier to read. There is some objectivity to the conclusion in that the eye more easily captures more evenly space word groups that those unevenly spaced, sometimes with relatively large gaps. I have no sources, but I have read this and find it true for me anyway.