10 fonts and what they say about your blog

By the time I wake up, I had better see some gifs illustrating each font. Maybe limpnerd was right about top ten lists...

HERE, HERE! I'm sick of the lack of creativity when it comes to universally acceptable font choices. I mean, you COULD go wild and have a font specifically designed to suit your needs, but then you'd annoy your visitors by insisting they install the font so they can read your site.

I always find myself coming back to boring basics when designing. It's not because other choices don't look better it's because it doesn't look the same across the board. Fonts are restricted by browsers and operating systems. I can't control the way they'll appear to visitors 100%. So, at least by sticking to the safe fonts I won't scare them away with gobbledygook.

PS. You know what would have really MADE this post, Ben? If you'd used each of these fonts to highlight their point. ;-) Of course, you'd have scared away your readers too. But it would have driven home the point that extra degree. ;-)

Point taken, thanks for the tip - fonts added. :)

I'm very much a verdana man, my boss is an Arial man, what does that say!??!

This is something new! Never seen on any blog till date. Good idea :D

I am so confused now, not sure what my personality or blog style is. Cute list!

Rhys - it shows you don't agree with your boss! ;)

Thanks Arun :)

Sorry to confuse you Debbie! :D

Whatever happened to Georgia and Courier?

Like you, I'm also frustrated by the lack of options when it comes to typography on the internet.

It will always be a challenge to come up with something unique every time.

Courier is up there - or do you mean why have people stopped using them?

Maybe we should just draw pictures.

Lol,
I am an Arial.
I use Trebuchet for my title though, and Verdana for links in my menu.

I think Verdana is the "fatter" version of Arial - it takes up too much width.

I'm the Arial and Georgia girl. :D But, I don't see Georgia here. Aiks..

Hey ! You left out the lovely Georgia !

Some of my readers like me use alternate operating systems like Linux and BSD and none of these operating systems are going to come with the above fonts in the first place.
So their browsers revert to default fonts like Bitstream Vera or DejaVu or Nimbus.
Adding the MS Core Fonts package can help but some fonts like Helvitica refuse to render in anti-alias and it hurts the eyes.

So instead of bothering with a list, of fonts, I simply specify font-family: "sans-serif" in the body tag. And so everybody can browse my site using their favourite font.

As a designer the lack of font choices makes me want to scream! I tend to mix it up a bit for variety, but it's important to never use too many fonts in a design. Consistency of use is also key. :)

Some of the above at different times. I agree, there aren't enough good choices for fonts. I used to make ASCII art. I always notice the font a site is using. There were really very few good fonts for ASCII art.

Hello there -- I'm the person with like 2500 font files on her computer (for graphics of course because no one would have a 10th of them installed on their own computer!). I guess I'm a Tahoma or Georgia fan depending on how flourishy I'm feeling.

Do you use a different type of font for titles/headings than you use in the body of your posts (not you, Ben -- the rest of you people). And what I mean by TYPE of font say a serif for titles/headings and sans serif for body text?

I think I'm more inclined to spice mine up with color rather than font type.

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One of my favorite comedians has a thing about Helvetica...he calls it a morally superior font, which just cracks me up. I guess he sometimes just throws emails away if they're not in helvetica. teehee I love crazy people.

I'm still using whatever lame font came installed in my theme. I know! That says nothing good! I can't even tell you what it is without going to go look (and I'm not gonna!) I have so much other crap to change that the font is hardly on my radar.

Thanks for another helpful and fun post!

I love Verdana, does that make me a bad person? LOL

Now that's what I'm talking about! Show the fonts so we can discuss them without scrambling through some control panel. The trick to using web fonts to so call them out on your stylesheet in the oreder of preference. That way if the reader owns them, it gets used. For example, in my style sheet is says "font-family:"Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Arial,Sans-Serif;" Most people see arial since its free.

@Turnip | Social Networking - Arial is not "free" as in free to use because Microsoft still holds rights to that.
Your theme must have been made by a Mac User !

Now my system has Helvetica installed so my browser will use that font when loading turnipofpower.com
But because Helvetica refuses to Anti-Alias on my system (for reasons I don't know) it renders badly and turns me away !
Problogger.net also has a similar setup unfortunately for me - so I stick to reading his blog from Google Reader.

As long as it's not white on black, I don't care what font it is. (But surprise there, huh?)

Fun list, Ben!

LOL!! You seriously had me freaking out until the end. As I read, I thought, OMG, what font CAN I use LOL!!!

So, I'm a little tired. Don't make fun...haha.

Anyway, I love the way you illustrated your point, and I must agree, choices are severely limited. Great list!

You hit it right on Ben. I guess this is something that I have only encountered a few times, I have tended to use a lot of templates for my sites previously however it would be nice to have some additional standardised fonts... ESPECIALLY between Mac and PC.

But I of course wouldn't be one to kick off a Mac VS PC Debate *grins*.

Stuart

Like Angie I panicked looking at the list: I'm doing my whole site in Verdana! I agree about the limited fonts available, I would love more variety but in the end I'll go for readability.

Wow, great comments everyone, thanks! Glad you all enjoyed the post. Good to see some new names here, too. :D

Hahaha I'm totally Garamond all the way. That's the font I use on my CV!

p.s. but I do ♥Helvetica

What does it say about you if you have no idea what font your blog is in? :P

All of the above!

Great article, worth considering. Don't entirely agree with all the analysis of font-choice, but, yes, there is some validity to it.
I used Arial and Verdana extensively when I first started working, both offline and online. Online I used Helvetica moreso. Loved the simplicity of them. About a year ago I suddenly started using Times New Roman, and more recently have started using Georgia and Garamond. HATE Comic-Sans with a vengeance.

Thanks Stephen. I'm not a fan of Comic Sans either.

I'm a teacher and many of my female coworkers feel like they need to use Comic Sans because it looks childish or something. I can't stand watching the PowerPoint presentations littered with it.

I'm a Georgia gal and sometimes Times Roman. I do wish there were more choices, too!

Bella

Thanks for the comments! :)

We need a browser that will render fonts from an online source. You could upload your font to the online source and then call it from a webpage.

This could solve the problem, I just don't know if it is possible..

There's a way to embed fonts using Flash, that may work for some sites. I haven't tried it though...

The only truly professional looking fonts are dripping like blood in my estimation. I'm actually furious that books aren't written in "Creepy" fonts.