The bounding box on a page layout that contains the live text and primary graphics, excluding the margins, headers, footers, and bleed areas. Designers define this space early in the layout process to ensure consistent text placement across a book or magazine. It dictates the maximum width and depth of the main content on every page.
Heard on the job
Keep all the body copy inside the type area, but let the background image bleed off the edge.
Also heard as
- live area
- text area