Suggestions for best font to type with

J

Jim Davis

Registered User
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Whats the best font to use for business letters and the office in general. Times new roman looks terrible and Arial is doesnt look great in letters. I'm thinking either Cailibri or Verdana, can anyone make any suggestions?
 
Garamond 12pt has a nice, clean, 'chiselled' look to it (and in MS Word, the apostrophes and quotation marks become 'smart', i.e. 66/99-style...).
 
Both Calibri (?) and Verdana are sans serif fonts with only subtle differences between them (e.g. capital i, j, q). They may lack the formality of a serif font for business correspondence, but each to their own and a lot depends on the impression you want to create with your correspondence.

Verdana, because of its lack of fuss, its clarity and ready availability is used in lots of web-sites.

Personally I use a modified, licenced Garamond, a serif font, for formal letters. I can't reproduce it here but something like -

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
 
Jim Davis said:
Verdana
Click to expand...

I always use this or ... the similar if a little more sedate, Tahoma.

Agree that Times looks awful - very conservative & authoritative. Tends to be the font of choice for solicitors/auditors etc as far as I can see.
 
Caveat said:
...
Agree that Times looks awful - very conservative & authoritative. Tends to be the font of choice for solicitors/auditors etc as far as I can see.
Click to expand...
For years it was the default font for multi-user WordPerfect packages installed on old Unix systems in solicitors / accountants offices!
 
I forgot to mention that Garamond also italicises beautifully.

Times New Roman is for people who believe it's beneath (or beyond?) them to change the default typeface.
 
Serif fonts (times, garamond etc) are the standard traditional fonts, commonly used by solicitors, accountants etc, as stated previously by another user. Sans Serif fonts (futura, gill sans, calibri) are used to give a more contemporary, friendly look; less threatening than serif fonts. It depends on the message you are trying to convey;
traditional & unmistakedly formal = Serif
contemporary & friendly = Sans Serif

Type in letters should not be above 10pt. Anything above that looks like a letter to someone with a sight impedement.

Trust me, I'm a graphic designer
 

I think 10pt is a bit small though, especially for Calibri I tend to go for 11pt. Below are a list of the fonts mentioned above.

Garamond
Times New Roman
Tahoma
Calibri
Verdana
Arial
 
enol said:
..........Type in letters should not be above 10pt. Anything above that looks like a letter to someone with a sight impedement.

Trust me, I'm a graphic designer
Click to expand...

I have to disagree. 10pt in Times New Roman ( at least in MS Word) is tiny. Most people would use 12 or even 13 in this font.
 
Another rule of thumb is to use a serif font for printed material, and sans-serif for screen reading, websites and so on.
Research has been done on this, and the serif font is easier to read on paper, and the latter on screen.

I use Arial 10 for most things that will be viewed on the screen, and Times New Roman for printing - if it's not broke...
For Garamond you'll probably need to go up 1-point size compared to Times NR to make it legible.
I don't like Tahoma, I think it's too informal, and don't get me started on Comic Sans... Gill Sans isn't a bad sans-serif font.
 
Jim Davis said:
I think 10pt is a bit small though, especially for Calibri I tend to go for 11pt. Below are a list of the fonts mentioned above.

Garamond
Times New Roman
Tahoma
Calibri
Verdana
Arial
Click to expand...

Great thread, was just looking to find a nice font & found some good suggestions here.

Have recently just started using Calibri but what do you think of Trebuchet MS as a sans serif font?
 
Whilst I quite like both of these, I think Calibri looks like it belongs in the text of a Powerpoint presentation or something more so than a letter.

Similarly, Trubuchet MS reminds me of the quoted, highlighted extracts that appear during magazine interviews.
 
Caveat said:
I always use this or ... the similar if a little more sedate, Tahoma.

Agree that Times looks awful - very conservative & authoritative. Tends to be the font of choice for solicitors/auditors etc as far as I can see.
Click to expand...


Cringing......better get rid of my Times 11 point right away
 
I use Goudy Old Style for my letters. Still formal enough but a million times better than Times New Roman! Experimented recently with Sylfaen but decided it was a bit too clear if you know what I mean?
 
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