Positions of time signatures

Standard time signatures are positioned on staves with the middle staff line, or only staff line for single-line staves, passing through their center. Large time signatures can be positioned in the middle or at the top of bracket groups, or above staves at system object positions.

Dorico Pro automatically positions time signatures after clefs, key signatures, and barlines.

You can move time signatures to different rhythmic positions in Write mode. They are positioned by default according to your settings in Engraving Options.

You can move individual time signatures graphically in Engrave mode; however, this does not change the rhythmic positions to which they are attached.

You can change the default positions of all time signatures project-wide, including both their horizontal and vertical positions, on the Spacing Gaps and Time Signatures pages in Engraving Options. You can change the default alignment of all time signatures shown at system object positions in the Time Signatures at System Object Positions section of the Time Signatures page.

You can also change the position of time signatures in each layout independently; for example, if you want to show time signatures above the staff and at system object positions in some layouts but only once per bracket in other layouts.