Spanish Typography Rules
Spanish publishing combines paired inverted punctuation with regional differences in separators and currency, especially across Latin America.
This page is written in English. The locale codes describe the text being typeset and the convention Avellio applies; they do not indicate the language of this web page.
At a glance
Quotation marks
Angular quotation marks are recommended in formal Spanish publishing, with double and single marks available for nesting; publisher usage varies.
Punctuation spacing
Opening ¿ and ¡ pair with closing marks. Avellio checks missing inverted punctuation and preserves Spanish punctuation logic.
Non-breaking spaces
No ordinary space appears inside paired question or exclamation marks; semantic number–unit and currency spacing remains locale-aware.
Dates
Day–month–year is the profile model.
Numbers
Spain uses a decimal comma model; ES LatAm is deliberately flexible because national conventions differ.
Currency
Spain expects euro context; regional profiles recognize ARS, CLP, COP, PEN and their common symbols. Plain $ is not assumed to mean USD.
Units
Use protected spacing where the publication standard requires a value and unit to remain together.
Regional variants
AUTO/report-only regional mappings also exist for Uruguay, Ecuador, Bolivia, Paraguay, and Venezuela, but they are not separate compact-menu choices in 1.1.0.
ESES LatAmES ARES CLES COES PEHouse-style caveat
Do not collapse all Latin American typography into one national standard.
How to use this with Avellio
- Assign accurate InDesign paragraph languages before relying on AUTO.
- Use an explicit profile when one regional convention governs the complete scope.
- Run a new Typography Audit after changing locale.
- Read locale source, specificity, confidence, and context together.
- Correct ambiguous dates, numbers, currencies, and complete quote pairs manually.
References
- Avellio User Manual — Locale profile referenceAvellio product source
- Real Academia Española — Ortografía básica de la lengua españolaNational language authority
- Unicode CLDR — Number and currency patternsLocale data standard