When I started in tech docs, Times New Roman was THE font for printed manuals. There was no ifs, buts, or maybes about this. Times New Roman. Size 11. Since then other more trendy fonts have come onto the market. Trends in font styles come and go. While fonts in printed publications are one thing, what’s the best font for writing on the web?
What’s the Best Font for Web Writing
Look at how CNN, Yahoo and Guardian use fonts. Similar or different?. Serif other Sans-Serif. We use Arial on this site, though Times New Roman and Courier are used for other tags, like code and quotes.
Blockquote – font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif
Code – font-family: Courier, monospace;
What is a Serif?
A Serif (from the French, I believe) is a font ‘with feet’ such as Times Roman; those without feet (i.e. Sans Serif) include Verdana and Arial
Like I said, we use Arial here, which I think is very readable. But design and UI ‘experts’ have told me that this is a bit dated and not ‘user-friendly’. They suggested Garamond.
What Do You Think Is the Best Font for Web Writing?
Which font do you use on your site? Do you find the fonts I’ve used here hard or easy on the eye?
Let me know what you think below.
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I'm a fan of Verdana for online viewing of body copy, with some serif and color on the headings
I use Verdana.
Hi Matt,
Looking at Jakob Nielsen’s style sheet’s he uses the following fonts
He is one of the leading UI and Usability folks on the web, so it’s interesting to see the fonts he’s chosen.
body – font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, Geneva, SunSans-Regular, sans-serif ; background: white; color: black;
code font-family: “Courier New”, Courier, Monaco, monospace;
H1, H2, H3, H4, H5, H6
font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, Geneva, SunSans-Regular, sans-serif; line-height: normal;
Looking at Jakob Nielsen’s style sheet’s he uses the following fonts
He is one of the leading UI and Usability folks on the web, so it’s interesting to see the fonts he’s chosen.
The site is here http://www.useit.com
Verdana reads well on the web. Not sure why but it strikes me as a 'strong' font, i.e. it has an immediate impact whereas others such as Gill Sans are too artistic.
Gill Sans is great for logos and other design work, but not for displaying text on a web page.
Wonder what's the best font for mobile devices, like the iphone?
Any thoughts?
Hi
Verdana is my No.1 choice for the web.
Cheers
Colin
The BBC's style sheet is here
http://news.bbc.co.uk/css/screen/1_0_15/nol/v4/...
You can look under the hood and see what fonts they use on their site – mostly Arial and Verdana