Default text leading in Affinity vs Adobe?

[LCamachoDesign]

I'm not sure if this is a bug on the Affinity (or Adobe's?) suite, or something else I'm not understanding. I'm betting on something I don't understand so I'd like to hear a word from someone knowledgeable in fonts. I've noticed the character leading default value is smaller and variable in all Affinity apps, while on Adobe with value is larger and fixed.

On Adobe's software, no matter what font you choose, you will always get the same default leading value for a certain font size. Let's always use 18 pt for clarity sake. So in Adobe you'll always have a (21.6 pt) character leading value for a 18 pt font size, regardless of the font chosen.

On Affinity for a 18 pt font size the leading will normally be (18 pt) too, but this value varies with the font chosen. I've only seen it going higher than (18 pt), but normally just a few decimal points. For example some fonts have a leading of (18.6 pt), others (18.4 pt). I have noticed an outlier though, Gabriola has a huge (30.6 pt) leading.

For what it's worth, the Affinity values seem a lot closer to what I'm seeing in LibreOffice, for example Gabriola has a huge leading value in both.

I'm not sure what to make of this... anyone knowledgeable in fonts can help me understand what's going on?

Thanks!

[Alfred]

34 minutes ago, LCamachoDesign said:

On Adobe's software, no matter what font you choose, you will always get the same default leading value for a certain font size. Let's always use 18 pt for clarity sake. So in Adobe you'll always have a (21.6 pt) character leading value for a 18 pt font size, regardless of the font chosen.

It sounds as though Adobe software has leading set by default to 120% of point size. You can do the same in the Affinity apps if you like, but if you don’t specify the leading value you’ll get whatever value the font designer has chosen.

Quote

On Affinity for a 18 pt font size the leading will normally be (18 pt) too, but this value varies with the font chosen. I've only seen it going higher than (18 pt), but normally just a few decimal points. For example some fonts have a leading of (18.6 pt), others (18.4 pt). I have noticed an outlier though, Gabriola has a huge (30.6 pt) leading.

Gabriola has some enormous swashes which would collide with the text above or below if it weren’t for that unusually large leading value.

[Wosven]

Using the designer font value is better than a default one that don't take in account th design of the fonts. Some fonts are made for using high leading, other small ones, because they were design with a specific usage in mind. 

For example, Uncial and similar calligraphies were made for writing few text in a page, needing lot of space between lines and characters to be readable, when blackletters calligraphies were condensed to put lot of text in a page. Fonts today keep on using those rules and needing more or less space, and a generic leading as in Word (120%) is rarey a good setting.

For example: on a header of 2-3 lines, they should look/feel together, as one paragraph (if it seems that it's 2 different lines/sentences, decrease the leading).

[LCamachoDesign]

Ok, so Adobe is using a fixed value while Affinity retrieves the value from the font itself. That clears it. Thanks for the answer!