Favorite Fonts

[PocketChange 0]

When choosing font for your website, do you go by what you like or what you think your users will like? We all want webpages that are easy to read and attract more visitors. Selecting a font can significantly affect the feel and usability of a webpage. There has been some research done suggesting that people in general prefer sans-serif fonts. San-serif fonts, or non-decorated fonts don't have extra lines around letters. Some examples: Arial, Verdana, Tahoma. Examples of serif fonts: Times New Roman, Georgia.I am curious to what people fonts people prefer to read or use in their webpages.Size is another issue? Would you rather read smaller, medium or large text?

[organicbmx 0]

the sans-serif font family is a must for websites. i can't really give you my favourite font becasue it is a selection of quite a few. but i can tell you the worst font ever:comic sans. it must have been invented by the devil or some evil madman purely for teachers to make worksheets with. never use it on a website as it is the most unprofessional font ever. it is best to use fonts on websites that people are not going to hate and that are easier to read. it is better that everyone thinks your font is bland that some people hate it.

[Sarah81 0]

I use Times New Roman. My site's pretty much nothing but written content, so I figured I should just go ahead and go with one of the most popular fonts for print publications. Why not, right? *grins*I also make the text fairly large. One thing that I loathe is going to a Web site specifically for its written content only to be stuck trying to read twenty long paragraphs that are all encoded with a 9-point font. Especially when the Web designer decides to do something super-cheesy, like change the text color to green but keep a white background.

Edited April 29, 2006 by Sarah81 (see edit history)

[Quatrux 4]

I prefer to use Sans in the browser which chooses the fonts I like, even though I get a CSS warning, but on most platforms and browsers I get the result I need. Serif is also great, but it is better for printing. The size depends, when it is to small and you have a lot of content, it is hard to read it, your eyes seems to hurt and there is a big chance that the user will close the tab/window, so making it optimal is a good idea. People use different screen resolutions, so using pixel width for fonts, not always is the best way, I think there is some good post about PT and PX differences on this forum you might want to search. :PFurthermore, I also like to use Verdana, Tahoma, but I really never liked Arial and Helvetica, they are really ugly for me.. Times New Roman on the web - I don't prefer it, but maybe it is just me, because a lot of whom is using it.

[cameronk_uk 0]

I like using..Jokerman.. (some times)i normaly use nice fonts that stand out

[aimeemayonnaise 0]

I prefer Verdana and Tahoma on webpages as they look nice without being too hard on the reader's eyes. Comic Sans MS doesn't bother me too much, but I can't stand the really over-the-top fonts (especially on webpages) that try to create pictures out of the letters so you can't read nor understand what has been written, unless you copy and paste it into Word and then change the font to something you can read -- but I'm too lazy to do that. As for the size of text, I don't like really large font (except for titles and headings) but I don't like really small font either, although I'm more likely to read a webpage with small font than I am large font. That being said, I prefer a balance inbetween.Another thing I can't stand about fonts, is the colour combinations. Text that is written on a dark background with a slightly lighter font is almost impossible to read, as is a white background with almost white text.

[ruben1405241511 0]

In layout you learn that you should use a serif font for headlines and sans-serif fonts for the texts. They also say, that you should be straight about your fonts, never use more than about three on a page (except maybe for some layouting statement..).Would you say that one can apply these rules to web design too?I would say that it is ok to use a more stylish font for headlines, but I would suggest to refrain from pictures of headlines with exotic fonts in them. One should stick to the standard fonts or at least have them as second choice. What are the standard fonts by the way? The ones I'd know by heart would be: Times New Roman, Verdana, Arial, Arial Black, Courier, Courier New, Comic Sans MS, Tahoma, Helvetica, Georgia.. But there might be fonts that aren't on Linux systems etc. Go Live has some standard font collections, that I use, meaning that I just trust that they got reliable combinations and move them in the order I want.I think there are techniques to embed a font in a CSS, anyone knows anything about that? Because some "exotic" fonts are really great and sometimes, you need a special kind (like Stencil fonts for me).interesting discussion!ruben

[nightfox1405241487 0]

I personally only use Verdana because it is widely used and I love how it looks on LCD monitors. I'll sometimes use Tahoma but there isn't a Tahoma on Linux so I leave that for my Windows laptop.But, if all else fails, there's Times (New Roman) as it is supported by every OS in the world.I must agree with organicbmx... Comic Sans should burn... Arial I used to like, but I don't have a taste for it anymore and I wish Google would change to Verdana or at least Tahoma!![N]F

[Diranikah 0]

1 Terminal

2 Arial

Terminal is my pick

[overworked 0]

I like most basic easily read fonts, but as for more advanced fonts (graphically) I was rather fond of Papyrus. Still I would stick with Bookman and Georgia the rest of the time.

[Arbitrary 0]

I like Jokerman and Chiller (for their style), but when it comes down to websites, I wouldn't use either. (I used Jokerman and Chiller as the fonts of choice in a bit of Firefox tweaking and I found reading them to be such a pain) For websites, probably some kind of Sans-serif font like Arial or Verdana would do. I used to like Times New Roman, but I just don't think it fits well on most websites.

I must agree with organicbmx... Comic Sans should burn... Arial I used to like, but I don't have a taste for it anymore and I wish Google would change to Verdana or at least Tahoma!!

Agreed! But I guess it's becoming their trademark, so changing the font might be a bit...weird for people who are stuck with tradition? :3

[sparx 0]

Personally, it depends on what sort of font is required - fixed width or a font with variable width.

 

Mostly, it's Verdana or Tahoma that I prefer for variable-width stuff.

 

For a fixed-width requirement, the Courier family isn't to my liking, so I prefer Lucida Console or OCR-A Extended

 

Sample OCR-A Extended by Microsoft

[cyborgxxi 0]

Ermm... let's see... I use Times New Roman and Arial almost all the time, and yeah, Arial beats TNR cuz it looks more ... neat? LOL I don't know, I like it more. I mean, I don't think anybody has TNR as their favorite font, do they? It's so bland... so yuck.Let's see.. I like Terminal (I use that as my MSN Messenger font) and hehe, I guess other people have Terminal and Arial as their fave fonts too! It's cool!Oh, I forgot to add Tahoma. I use that often

[doudou 0]

I have to agree that comic sans is the worst font for anything. Since most of us are reminded of those boring high school assignments. My favorite fonts to read on the web are: Georgia, Verdana, Helvetica and Trebechet MS. Generally I prefer smaller fonts that are spaced out. Because no matter how I look at it, large fonts looks like grade school kids trying to write.

[patronus4000 0]

I tend to go by both. I like Trebuchet MS, Georgia and Arial, which are already fonts that many sites use currently. They work well on screen and they look cool, so I'm sure that everyone including myself would be happy with them. ^^ For other things, I also like Courier New (which I use sometimes for the monospaced stuff), Century Gothic, XG Pixo (monospaced, pixelated font), and Morpheus, even though I rarely get the chance to use the latter.

 

As for the size, I generally go for smaller sizes because they look less scary. XD Huge text looks scary to me; I stick to 12px, which roughly translates to 10pt. But my text looks horrible to me for some reason it they're 14px (12pt). They don't match my layout. I'm pretty sure a few of my visitors hate me for having my body text in such a small font, but the only thing I can say is just to zoom in! =D

 

Serena