How far apart do you position your speakers ?

I find that a listening distance of 1.5 times the spacing between speakers works best.

If you listen at 6 feet then speakers spaced 4 feet, at 9 feet spaced 6 feet apart, and at 12 feet spaced 8 feet.

I find the often recommended equilateral triangle with toe in does not sound as realistic.

I prefer speakers facing forwards and square to the room - no toe in or toe out.

I do not respect speakers that change their sound character with angle.

I will only use speakers with even dispersion across the main frequency range.

As far as they need to be.

Not all loudspeakers are designed for facing forwards most are designed with toe in in mind. The reason is the frequency response on and off axis. There is no rule that could ever tell me where to place a loudspeaker or how far apart. To many variables. So best to set them up to sound best to the owner weather placements right or wrong is subjective and even ones height or chair height, room decor, seating distance ,room and speaker size, speakers radiation pasterns etc. all can effect placement. No one way for all loudspeakers and the formulas to me are all far to over simplified and biased to have any real use.

I think Johnk just said it all. There are plenty of formula's, get one to work

I can't believe Sebrof was the first to mention toe in.

Badly written speaker manuals for the last 30 years or so have often referenced the "hole in the middle" of the stereo image when speakers get pushed too far apart.

Greater degrees of toe in will increase the distance where this first occurs, but may also change the tonal balance of the speaker.

I have also found that there is not necessarily a point of apples to apples equilibrium with greater toe in and greater distance vs lesser toe in and lesser distance.

Although there may be a relationship with respect to where the hole in the middle begins, the two different set ups can create a completely different sound and image.

Planars behave differently from other speakers, but after years of experimenting with different models, I found that setting up Magnepans with no toe in often created the widest and most expansive image, while also softening the treble a bit.

In summary, there is no simple formula or easy answer to this question and every inch counts, although is it usually a safe bet that farther out from both rear and side walls is a good thing.