Tall as in "pops spread across fewer well developed planets instead of spread across more less developed planets" does not currently exist in Stellaris. At least, it doesn't exist as a proper option compared to wide. Pop growth is fundamentally tied to your number of planets, and pops are power so more planets is always better. Period. As someone else said, sprawl just reduces the lead large empires have over small empires.
Some empires interact with sprawl a bit differently, but that's more about how they manage expansion than tall vs wide.
Machines have to work harder to keep up with sprawl increases from their number of planets, but that just slows them down a bit to balance out the fact that they can colonize every planet type with no habitability penalties. They still want as many planets as possible because again, planets equal pop growth and pops are power. This is every so slightly less true for machines because their pop growth is also tied to the level of their planetary capital, but the best way to start pushing all of your planets up to the required 50 pops to build the tier 4 capital is to go wide and make your pops resettle to a few worlds you're developing at a time. Refraining from wide expansion doesn't help you get those higher level capitals any faster.
Hive minds have reduced sprawl penalties, so they don't need to invest as heavily in science and unity to keep up as they expand. This means they can invest a larger proportion of their economy in alloys for expansion and military without falling behind other empires in technology or traditions. Alternatively, they can invest the same amount and be faster in terms of technology and traditions.
Megacorps have harsher sprawl penalties, so they are highly encouraged to optimize their build to maximize bang for buck in terms of power per sprawl. They get branch offices which provide a huge amount of value for the amount of sprawl they generate, and they really want to lean into trade, ring worlds, ecumenopolises, and diplomacy, which are all fairly sprawl efficient compared to traditional expansion via systems and planets. Still, they likely want to maintain a lot of small planets that have minimal districts and pops, just enough to maximize growth, so that they can have the pop growth to keep up, as being more sprawl efficient only goes so far.
As for regular empires, they don't have any bonuses or penalties for sprawl, but they are unique in that they can more effectively use pops they get from conquest, and they can integrate vassals. Megacorps can conquer, too, but they are held back more by sprawl than regular organic empires.
The closest thing we have to a proper tall empire is having your planets spread across fewer systems. Habitats are the way to do this, and Void Dwellers are the king of habitats. I think megacorps have some advantages on top of that because they do trade better and your energy will be pretty trade reliant when going heavy into habitats. Gestalts also have an advantage because they can get energy from every habitat instead of needing to rely on trade. I haven't tried this strategy out too much, so I'm not an expert by any means. This isn't what most people think of when they think of "tall," but it's the closest thing that can properly keep up in pop growth without grabbing as many systems and planets as possible.
