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Times New Roman alternatives: You can do better (2013)

practicaltypography.com

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Re: Times New Roman alternatives: You can do better (2013)

#3
post #2

Honestly speaking for myself I think roboto and Calibri are excellent fonts. Readable and aesthetically pleasing, what's the general opinion on these default fonts in the typography world?

I don't mind Calibri, but I've always thought it was a surprising choice as a default since whenever MS Word switched to it. It just looks too "friendly" for "serious business" to me. I think if you interpolated between Helvetica and Comic Sans you'd get something like Calibri on the way. (PS I know nothing about typography.)

Re: Times New Roman alternatives: You can do better (2013)

#4
post #2

Honestly speaking for myself I think roboto and Calibri are excellent fonts. Readable and aesthetically pleasing, what's the general opinion on these default fonts in the typography world?

My opinion: Calibri is an excellent font, created by one of the leading contemporary typographers, but like every default font, it is a non-choice, too boring for professional applications where style is a concern, thanks to its ubiquity.

Roboto is (or: has become, its beginnings were somewhat rough) a great screen font, but for printed applications, it tends to look a little dull. This has to do with ubiquity, but also with the simplicity that is inherent to most screen fonts.

Re: Times New Roman alternatives: You can do better (2013)

#5
post #2

Honestly speaking for myself I think roboto and Calibri are excellent fonts. Readable and aesthetically pleasing, what's the general opinion on these default fonts in the typography world?

I don't mind Calibri, but I've always thought it was a surprising choice as a default since whenever MS Word switched to it. It just looks too "friendly" for "serious business" to me. I think if you interpolated between Helvetica and Comic Sans you'd get something like Calibri on the way. (PS I know nothing about typography.)

I'd bet that was partly on purpose to try and curb comic sans usage

Re: Times New Roman alternatives: You can do better (2013)

#7
The best three fonts are: "sans-serif" (for general use), "monospace" (for code), and "serif" (for when you need a secondary font for contrast).

The choice of implementation for these fonts should be left to the reader (who will probably use the defaults for their browser/ebook reader). This way everybody gets the fonts they're used to, which are the easiest fonts to read. I don't even know which exact font I'm looking at now, but I know that I don't allow web designers to change it.

Re: Times New Roman alternatives: You can do better (2013)

#8
post #2

Honestly speaking for myself I think roboto and Calibri are excellent fonts. Readable and aesthetically pleasing, what's the general opinion on these default fonts in the typography world?

I don't care for Calibri and I wish Segoe were the default in Word.

Re: Times New Roman alternatives: You can do better (2013)

#9
post #2

Honestly speaking for myself I think roboto and Calibri are excellent fonts. Readable and aesthetically pleasing, what's the general opinion on these default fonts in the typography world?

They are excellent fonts. Neither is default across platforms though, nor are they serif fonts...

For a sans serif, default font, I like Palatino. Classic, nice open counters.

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