Roman page numbering not aligned in table of contents (ToC)

Question

My page numbering isn't aligned properly starting with page VIII. It seems to be somehow focused on the X, but also the second chapter isn't aligned properly, where the first, which has arabic numbers, is properly aligned.
Do you have a clue how to solve this?

MWE.tex

\documentclass[a4paper,12pt]{report}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\begin{document}
        \tableofcontents
        \pagenumbering{arabic}
        \chapter{Chapter}
                \section{Lorem}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{ipsum}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                        \pagenumbering{Roman}
                \section{dolor}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{sit}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{amet}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{consectetuer}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{adipiscing}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{elit}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{Ut}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
        \chapter{Chapter}
                \section{purus}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{elit}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{vestibulum}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{ut}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
                \section{placerat}
                        \lipsum[1]\newpage
\end{document}

See also the following possible duplicate: In table of contents, long page numbers intrude on right margin despite plenty of available space Increasing the space allocated the the page numbers should also resolve the misalignment you see in your example document. — leandriis, Dec 15 '20 at 12:39
@leandriis Although it's suggested using \makeatletter \def\@pnumwidth{50pt}\makeatother in the preamble, it seems not to work 100 % for page numbering printed bold, but that might be a lot more work to do. So… it's OK for now ;-) — Nepumuk, Dec 15 '20 at 13:52

Peter Wilson · Answer 1 · 2020-12-15T18:15:45.353

1

The usual solution is to use the tocloft package and it's \cftsecnumwidth{<length>} to set the space for page numbers. You have to specify the <length> argument to suit your document. Below 2em works for your MWE.

\documentclass[a4paper,12pt]{report}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage{tocloft}
\cftsetpnumwidth{2em}  % space for page numbers, default is 1.55em
\begin{document}
% all the rest of your MWE

edited Dec 15 '20 at 18:15

answered Dec 15 '20 at 18:05

Peter Wilson

28,066

But then all dots end at a same fixed place, independent of the number width. The behavior is different on the other side. Why having a fix width box is the best design solution? – Simon Dispa Dec 15 '20 at 19:31

Simon Dispa · Answer 2 · 2020-12-15T14:48:59.817

It can be solved with a small modification of \@dottedtocline (file latex.ltx). I added more pages to the MWE to see more Roman letters.

\documentclass[a4paper,12pt]{report}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\makeatletter
\def@dottedtocline#1#2#3#4#5{%
    \ifnum #1>\c@tocdepth \else
    \vskip \z@ @plus.2\p@
    {\leftskip #2\relax \rightskip @tocrmarg \parfillskip -\rightskip
        \parindent #2\relax@afterindenttrue
        \interlinepenalty@M
        \leavevmode
        @tempdima #3\relax

        \advance\leftskip @tempdima \null\nobreak\hskip -\leftskip
        {#4}\nobreak
        \leaders\hbox{$\m@th
            \mkern @dotsep mu\hbox{.}\mkern @dotsep
            mu$}\hfill
        \nobreak
    %\hb@xt@@pnumwidth{\hfil\normalfont \normalcolor #5%
    {\hfil\normalfont \normalcolor #5%

            \kern-\p@\kern\p@}%
        \par}%

    \fi}

\makeatother
\begin{document}
\tableofcontents

\pagenumbering{arabic}
\chapter{Chapter 1}
    \section{Lorem}
    \lipsum[1-18]\newpage
    \section{ipsum}
    \lipsum[1]\newpage
    \pagenumbering{Roman}
    \section{dolor}
    \lipsum[1-16]\newpage
    \section{sit}
    \lipsum[1-16]\newpage
    \section{amet}
    \lipsum[1]\newpage
    \section{consectetuer}
    \lipsum[1-8]\newpage
    \section{adipiscing}
    \lipsum[1]\newpage
    \section{elit}
    \lipsum[1-15]\newpage
    \section{Ut}
    \lipsum[1]\newpage
\chapter{Chapter 2}
    \section{purus}
    \lipsum[1-14]\newpage
    \section{elit}
    \lipsum[1]\newpage
    \section{vestibulum}
    \lipsum[1-16]\newpage
    \section{ut}
    \lipsum[1-16]\newpage
    \section{placerat}
    \lipsum[1]\newpage
\end{document}

when before it was

the change replacing

 \nobreak
 \hb@xt@\@pnumwidth{\hfil\normalfont \normalcolor #5%
                    \kern-\p@\kern\p@}%
 \par}%
\fi}

by

 \nobreak
 {\hfil\normalfont \normalcolor #5%
                    \kern-\p@\kern\p@}%
 \par}%
\fi}

A fixed box does not work. The alignment also works with

\hb@xt@35\p@{\hfil\normalfont \normalcolor #5%

but obviously the dots do not look so nice with a fixed width, which is the problem with the kind of answers in

In table of contents, long page numbers intrude on right margin despite plenty of available space

versus

My TeX is not good enough to go any further.

With your actual solution, the page numbers of every chapter is shifted some pt to the right… — Nepumuk, Dec 15 '20 at 14:13
@Nepumuk I do not see the effect you are mentioning. Please see the last figure. — Simon Dispa, Dec 15 '20 at 14:33

Roman page numbering not aligned in table of contents (ToC)

2 Answers2