Spacing with Punctuation

Jul 18, 2016

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Rule 1
With a typewriter or word processor, you sometimes use one space or two spaces following punctuation. With a computer, use only one space following periods, commas, semicolons, colons, exclamation points, question marks, and quotation marks. With a computer, the space needed after these punctuation marks is proportioned automatically.
Rule 2
Use no spaces on either side of a hyphen. (For more rules about hyphens, see page 65).
- Example:
  We borrowed twenty-three sheets of paper.
NOTE
For spacing with ellipsis marks, see the section that follows. For spacing with en and em dashes, see page 68.