Selecting The Right Scalable Fonts

Typefaces make products more memorable and personable. They also engage, entice, command attention, and support brand recognition. When making font choices, four factors are key: legibility (will the fonts be easy to read?), versatility (will the fonts consistently suit the intended use?), impact (will the fonts deliver the desired effect?), and language (do the fonts support the languages required?).

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Fonts for mobile environments can be split loosely into two categories: fonts for user interface and body copy, and fonts that convey themes. User interface fonts emphasize legibility—designs that promote ease-of-use and at-a-glace reading at arm’s length. They also work well for body copy and other text (Fig. 6).

Good font choices support user-interface (UI) designs that are distinctive and understated, not overpowering, and a range of widths and proportions. They also should support a sans serif typeface, which is characterized by the absence of serifs and is the most likely choice for user interfaces and body copy in the mobile environment. Themed fonts are selected to fit design concepts of games, applications, branding and other mobile projects. Look for selections that will complement themes or provide a high level of legibility for user interface environments (Fig. 7).

Critical Attributes

When selecting fonts for mobile phones, choose designs that offer:

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  Ample x-height: X-height is the vertical height of lowercase letters (Fig. 8). Optimal legibility is achieved as long as the x-height is not excessively large. As more than 95 percent of the letters we read are lower case, larger glyph proportions usually result in a more legible typeface.
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  Open counters: Counters are the white space within letters such as o, e, and c, which help to define a character. Larger counters aid character recognition (Fig. 8).
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  Modest stroke contrast: The stroke is the solid part of a character. Typefaces that have a strong contrast in character stroke weights do not translate well to most mobile devices. Not enough pixels are available to reproduce the contrast differences at small sizes. Characters become more difficult to distinguish.
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  Obvious weight changes: Typeface families that have a marked differentiation between the various weights and proportions aid in creating communication hierarchy and ensuring logical graphical communication.
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  Space efficiency: Condensed typefaces of light to medium weight work well in cramped typographic quarters because their counters are less likely to fill in.
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  Branded type: Beyond legibility and style, mobile fonts can convey corporate identity (Fig. 9). Companies may choose to optimize established corporate or brand typefaces for mobile use, or companies may opt for mobile-ready fonts that complement or work alongside corporate typefaces. Multilingual fonts may be linked, or character sets may be modified or extended to enable international usage of corporate fonts.

Steven R. Martin is responsible for the development of Monotype Imaging software products. Prior to joining Monotype Imaging in 2005, Martin was the director of development at Newmarket International, an enterprise software development firm. He also has worked for Scansoft (now Nuance), ExperVision, and Lotus in various engineering and executive positions.

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