New Participant

Allow percentages for line height

Forum|Forum|2 years ago
April 17, 2024
197 replies
25150 views

Firstly great job Figma Font variables are here!!!

Figma tutorial: Variables for typography

The only thing missing is the use of percentages in the line-height property.

You can not use a percentage in the line-height as it only accepts variables that are a number type.

Although the variables for line-height caters for pixel (absolute) line-heights (10,12,14)- it does not accommodate relative line heights.

In other words you can’t use percentage variables for line heights that are a percentage of the font size (100%, 120%,150%).

Interestingly …You can use a variable for letter-spacing ( which accepts a number variable - but reads it as a percentage) - the challenge remains that line heights by default are absolute not percentages - even though you can input a percentage.

Percentages allow greater flexibility and less calculations

Word around would be to allow formula in a variable
e.g. =[variable] * 1.5

Or figuring out a way for the line height to be toggle between absolute or relative application of the number variable.

Show previous replies

Lukita

Agree, 100%! Heheh, we need percentage-based line height.

pierrelord

New Participant

Agree.

This could be made even more powerful, by allowing number fields to accept string vars (where a % could be entered) - kinda dirty, but this would solve the % feature (?)
Even more powerful if variables accepted calculations referring to other vars like =[line-height-default]*1.5

Andreas_Nordenson

New Participant

I totally agree with this.

johanfjr.com

New Member

+1 for this feature

rahendz

Hi Figma, congratulations on reaching this milestone! It’s awe-inspiring. I wanted to share an idea regarding typography. Specifically, I’d like to talk about the text property. Instead of specifying the exact number of pixels for line height, I prefer using relative numbers like 1.5, 1.6, or 2. This approach offers more flexibility and maintaining consistency across different text easier.

However, I’m open to using exact pixel values when necessary.