How big is the text area in a standard LaTeX document?

Question

If you run a typeset a LaTeX document without any packages or options, what are the width and height of the main text area? That is, excluding the running title and page numbers. I know I could try to measure it, but ideally I'd like to have an official source.

Answer 1

Depends on the documentclass, but try one of the options below.

You may be aware of this, but one thing to note: Lengths are given in points, where 1pt = 1/72.27in. This is different from the PostScript point, where 1pt = 1/72in, which is commonly used elsewhere (see e.g. geometry package - paperwidth and paperheight aren't accurate).

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{layout}
\begin{document}
\layout
\end{document}

---

\documentclass{article}
\begin{document}
Width of text block: \the\textwidth

Height of textblock: \the\textheight
\end{document}