What is Lorem Ipsum?
Where the Lorem Ipsum placeholder text comes from, why designers use it, and when to use real copy instead.
The standard Lorem Ipsum text
The classic Lorem Ipsum passage that appears in virtually every design mockup reads:
"Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat."
This is the version that's been in use since the 1960s. The full passage is much longer.
Where does it come from?
Lorem Ipsum is derived from De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum ("On the Ends of Good and Evil"), a philosophical treatise written by the Roman statesman Cicero in 45 BC.
The original Latin discusses Epicurean and Stoic philosophy. The Lorem Ipsum text is a scrambled, altered version of a passage from Book 1, Section 32 — it was deliberately mangled so the words don't form coherent sentences, preventing readers from getting distracted by the content.
The specific version in use today became standard in the 1960s when Letraset, a company that produced rub-on transfer sheets for designers, used it to fill their typeface specimen sheets. It was later popularized by desktop publishing software — most notably PageMaker in 1985 — and has been the default placeholder text ever since.
Why designers use placeholder text
When designing a layout, the goal is to evaluate the structure — spacing, hierarchy, typography, visual flow — without being distracted by what the text actually says. Placeholder text serves this purpose in several ways:
- —Neutral content: Real content triggers reactions — you notice typos, disagree with phrasing, or get pulled into reading. Meaningless text keeps the focus on layout decisions.
- —Realistic letter distribution: Lorem Ipsum uses a natural mix of short and long words, matching the visual texture of real Latin or English text. This produces realistic line breaks and paragraph shapes.
- —Separates design from copywriting: Placeholder text lets designers and writers work in parallel. The layout doesn't have to wait for final copy, and the copy doesn't have to conform to a fixed layout.
- —Universal recognition: Clients and stakeholders understand that "lorem ipsum" means "this is a placeholder." It signals clearly that the content is not final — unlike a draft sentence that might be mistaken for approved copy.
When NOT to use Lorem Ipsum
Placeholder text is a tool for early-stage design. There are situations where it actively causes problems:
- User testing
- If you're testing whether users understand your interface, Lorem Ipsum makes the test meaningless. Participants can't read the content, so they can't evaluate whether the layout communicates the right message.
- Final client review
- Presenting a design with placeholder text to a client who is approving it for production is a common mistake. It obscures how the layout will actually behave with real, varying-length content — headlines that are longer or shorter than expected will break the design.
- Content-heavy designs
- For designs where the content itself drives the layout (news sites, documentation, marketing landing pages), Lorem Ipsum produces a false sense of how the design will work. Real content should be drafted as early as possible in these cases.
- Shipped code
- Placeholder text occasionally ends up in live products by accident. Set a linting rule or review checklist that flags "lorem ipsum" before any production deploy.
Frequently asked questions
- Does Lorem Ipsum mean anything?
- The scrambled version used as placeholder text doesn't mean much — it was deliberately altered to be non-readable. But the original source (Cicero's De Finibus) does have meaning. "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet" roughly translates to "pain itself, because it is pain, because..." — a fragment from a longer philosophical argument about pleasure and pain.
- Are there alternatives to Lorem Ipsum?
- Yes. "Hipster Ipsum" generates trendy-sounding filler text. "Bacon Ipsum" uses meat-related words. "Cupcake Ipsum" uses dessert terms. These can make mockups more entertaining to review, but the classic Lorem Ipsum remains the universal standard because everyone immediately recognizes it as placeholder.
- How much Lorem Ipsum should I use?
- Enough to simulate the realistic length of your actual content. For a blog post layout, fill it to roughly the word count your real posts will be. For a headline, use a placeholder the same approximate length as your planned headline. Mismatched lengths hide layout problems that will appear with real content.