The Best Fonts, According to Science

We all know our favorite fonts, but did you ever think about why some fonts are just clearer than others? Well there's a surprising amount of research into just what makes certain fonts better, and there's a case to be made for that loveably goofy Comic Sans.

Hosted by: Stefan Chin
----------
----------
Huge thanks go to the following Patreon supporters for helping us keep SciShow free for everyone forever: Adam Brainard, Alex Hackman, Ash, Benjamin Carleski, Bryan Cloer, charles george, Chris Mackey, Chris Peters, Christoph Schwanke, Christopher R Boucher, DrakoEsper, Eric Jensen, Friso, Garrett Galloway, Harrison Mills, J. Copen, Jaap Westera, Jason A Saslow, Jeffrey Mckishen, Jeremy Mattern, Kenny Wilson, Kevin Bealer, Kevin Knupp, Lyndsay Brown, Matt Curls, Michelle Dove, Piya Shedden, Rizwan Kassim, Sam Lutfi
----------
Looking for SciShow elsewhere on the internet?

#SciShow #science #education #learning #complexly
----------
Sources:

Image Sources:

[kirkrowe]

It's not just 'more space' between letters in Courier, it's a monospaced font, meaning every letter and space is the same width on every character. Very handy for coding!

[thomascastleman]

As a programmer, Courier is the bomb. Some characters (like l and I, or O and 0) look VERY similar in certain fonts. Courier and other Serif fonts make these letters easier to tell apart, which is very important when debugging code. Courier is even fixed-width so it helps with eyeballing indentation and line length.

[harvest]

Comic Sans is a wonderful way to figure out who likes to hate stuff for no reason.

[kiomopo]

i have a comic sans tattoo which reads "memento mori" sometimes i cover most of it so it just reads "meme"

[pumpkinghead]

My favorite font is Verdana for the simple fact that it's a sans serif font in which the capital I and lowercase L are actually DISTINCT from each other.

[lutilda]

Personally, I don't find Comic Sans to be hard to read, but it gives a sense of informal/ light hearted/ childishness that causes issues when used as an inappropriate design choice. 😂 I think that's why it has the reputation it does. Though it's perfect for use in comic books!

[mariaraposabranca]

Tip for writers: whenever you get tired, swap your document's font to Comic Sans (or another radically different font, but comic sans is just strikingly different than most). You'll recover some stamina and notice more mistakes to correct!

[neenajaydon]

As a graphic design student, I was happy to see this topic covered. I don’t know if I will ever have a default font again because the suitability of a font depends on the situation, and I spend a lot of time discovering new fonts I like.

[Rubrickety]

Helvetica: “Arial? ARIAL?? That pathetic wannabe?? HOLD MY CLEANLY-DESIGNED, NEGATIVE-SPACE-BALANCED BEER!!”

[ravioliis_]

I absolutely adore comic sans. It's super readable for dyslexic people, ESL learners, people who have trouble focusing, etc, etc. Also, it just has a super fun, loose personality to it. Whenever I would have to type anything for school, I learned that typing it up first in comic sans helped me get my thoughts out of my head quicker and easier.

[AdrianHereToHelp]

An example of a font specifically developed for people with low vision is Atkinson Hyperlegible, which was made by the Braille Institute. It's a really cool font, and tries to make sure letter differentiation is as easy as possible without making the whole thing look like a ransom note.

[WildFyreful]

Fonts come up quite a bit in the accessibilty community, mainly around which is the most accessible for people with vision problems. So, so glad to see you cover this topic!

[PaddyWolfe]

The Interdisciplinary Journal of Signage and Wayfinding... i had no idea this was a thing.

[jonyeawright]

You used the word kerning to describe letter spacing. Kerning affects letter spacing but is not the same thing. You also neglected to mention that Courier is a fixed pitch font. It was invented for the typewriter. With fixed pitch fonts every character has the same width which means fewer characters can fit on a line. On a screen where space may be limited, fewer character will fit. In book printing this results in more pages and costs.

[RILDIGITAL]

Never knew fonts could impact so much more than just aesthetics. Definitely going to be more conscious about the fonts I use in the future.

[amdan]

As a Russian learner, it's sometimes hard to distinguish between Cyrillic п and л in certain sans serif fonts. That little hook on the latter is very important, and it's usually more obvious in serif fonts. But for native-level readers it might not matter so much since it's known that you learn to recognize the shape of entire words rather than reading them letter by letter.

[chrismeandyou]

The CORRECT answer is Tahoma.
Some others may look nice, but they don't show things like these two letters: I l properly.
You can't tell one is an i and one is an L.

[michaelwright]

It was really useful to hear that spacing is a major factor in readability across different font styles.

Times New Roman is the most common serif font, but it was specifically designed to get the most letters in the smallest space, so it's not an especially good test of the readability of serif fonts. Its ubiquity is a result of commercial choices.

About thirty years ago, I composed a guide to learning a language directed at strictly monolingual students; so, it had to introduce a lot of new concepts, as well as the detail of the language. I was printing out a draft, and someone came in and asked what it was. I explained, and added (with a tone of voice that I thought was evidently cynical) "And I've set it in Comic Sans, so it will be easier to understand." "Good idea, " they said. So I left it in Comic Sans, rather than changing it to Garamond.

[vanaals]

Fonts are my life.

I suffered severe interest in fonts when first studying commercial art in college. That segued into further exploration working as a layout artist for a manufacturer of marine gauges and instrument panels. And, during all the in-between times, there was experimentation when designing posters and programs for the entertainment industry. (There was serious thought behind which to use for reading in dim light, when sitting in a seat in a theater.)

[squirrel]

I continue to love and admire this channel for communicating nuance accessibly <3