Ellipses

An ellipsis (plural: ellipses) is a set of three contiguous dots that are used to indicate omission of part of a sentence, phrase, paragraph, or content. For documentation purposes, use three periods as the dots in an ellipse, unless you use an ellipsis character. An ellipsis is also used in informal writing to connote a subsiding, hesitating, or fading expression. The word ellipsis originates from the Greek word meaning “omission”.

Using ellipses

Punctuation and spacing

Use three contiguous periods in a row while writing an ellipsis. Avoid using the ellipsis character and make use of periods in general. Insert one space before and after the ellipsis unless a punctuation mark immediately follows the ellipsis; in this case, don’t insert a space after the ellipsis.

Examples

In text

Don’t use ellipses in your documentation. If you have to use ellipses in your documentation, rewrite your content excluding all unnecessary information while including the necessary information. Using ellipses in quoted text is acceptable, unless they appear at the beginning or the end of the text.

Examples

Ending a sentence with an ellipsis

When a sentence ends with an ellipsis, insert a period right after the three dots of the ellipsis, without any intervening space. This applies for ellipses both in quoted and unquoted text.

Examples

In a user interface

Only use ellipses in user interfaces if it is absolutely needed to indicate a pause in conversational UI messages. For example, the text in a UI message might read “Searching the database …“.
When UI elements have text with ellipses in them, exclude them from the documentation describing that UI element, unless it could cause confusion. For example, if the text in the user interface reads “Publish …“, document the text as “click Publish“.

In illustrations

If required, you can use ellipses in multiple-part callouts, such as in images, illustrations, screenshots, and graphics. Insert a space before the ellipsis at the end of a phrase that continues later; and insert an ellipsis followed by a space at the beginning of a phrase that’s continued from a previous phrase. If the callout ends with additional punctuation, such as a period or comma, insert a space between the punctuation mark and the ellipsis.

Example

Suspension points

When ellipses are used to connote hesitation, a pause, or an unfinished thought, they are known as suspension points. Generally, suspension points indicate an informal, spoken language tone. Avoid using suspension points in your documentation.

Example