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Inspiring
Mar 13, 2026 7:41 AM UTC
Answered

How to Reduce Paragraph Spacing While Keeping Text Aligned to the Baseline Grid in InDesign

The document I am working with, the author wants spaces between the paragraphs, not indents. As a result, the book is getting too long and I was wondering if there’s any way of reducing the spacing between the paragraphs and still not losing the text alignment with the baseline.

Kindly see the revised file...thank you so much again

    Peter Kahrel
    Peter KahrelCorrect answer
    Community Expert
    Mar 13, 2026 9:32 AM UTC

    If you want to keep the text aligned to the baseline grid you can change the space between paragraphs only in multiples of the grid, that is, no space, one line space, two line spaces. There’s no way around that.

    6 replies

    rob day
    Community Expert
    Community Expert
    Mar 13, 2026 1:22 PM UTC

    Hi ​@chi wail72431016 , Also, this might help on baseline grid alignment rules:

     

     

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    Peter Kahrel
    Community Expert
    Peter KahrelCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
    Community Expert
    Mar 13, 2026 9:32 AM UTC

    If you want to keep the text aligned to the baseline grid you can change the space between paragraphs only in multiples of the grid, that is, no space, one line space, two line spaces. There’s no way around that.

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    Inspiring
    Mar 13, 2026 2:15 PM UTC

    Is it considered a bad practice if i simply turn the baseline grid off and let teh text simply flow?

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    Derek Cross
    Community Expert
    Community Expert
    Mar 13, 2026 2:19 PM UTC

    Peter has the best suggestion, so if for example, your text is say 11/14pt , set the baseline grid to 7pt and you can then set the paragraphs to half a line space, which will look better than a whole blank line space and safe you some overall document length.

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