Accessibility is perhaps the most important key for a website. There is no use for a website if people are not able to access it. For that reason, the font style choices are crucial to be considered.
Sans Serif fonts are possibly some ideal choices for the accessibility of a website. However, are they the only ideal fonts? Or are there other styles of fonts that are better choices for the website accessibility?
Why Are Fonts Important for Web Accessibility?
It is obvious that there has to be some writing on a website. Even if the website focuses on showing graphics, there are still some words or sentences to describe them.
The choice of font style is important since people have different reading abilities. Some people need specific tools to read the words on a website, while others simply can only read bigger or clearer words.
Furthermore, people who do not have any reading problems can benefit from a good font choice. They use various devices with large screens like a computer or a laptop or small screens like a smartphone to read a website.
For those reasons, the website needs to adapt to those phenomena with the correct font style. The owner of the website has to choose the most appropriate fonts for the website to be accessible.
What Is Sans Serif?
Sans Serif fonts can be compared to Serif fonts to be easily understood. The things that differentiate those types of fonts are additional small bits or features on the ends of some fonts. Serif fonts are the fonts that have those features while the other fonts do not.
For example, the letter ‘l’ from Serif fonts has small details on the letter’s top and bottom. On the other hand, the letter from the other fonts is just a straight ‘l’ without additional details, making them look clean, solid, and simple. Therefore, the words that use the fonts can be read easily.
Some examples of common Serif fonts are Times New Roman, Georgia, Palatino, and Garamond, and other common examples of Sans Serif fonts are Arial, Helvetica, and Tahoma. Nevertheless, there are still plenty more in existence from both types of fonts.
Serif fonts are often used for printed media like books, newspapers, and magazines since they can be easily recognizable. On the flip side, Sans Serif fonts are preferable to be used for on-screen texts as some smaller screens are not able or stumble to show serif details.
Recommended Fonts for Websites
There are not any specific demands about fonts that can be used for website accessibility. Still, if accessibility is the key, it is better to use common and popular fonts to increase the ability to be displayed on any device.
Unless the goal is to show the beauty of certain fonts, avoid using overly decorated fonts such as the Script fonts. The fonts are pretty and perfect for titles, headings, announcements, advertisements, and t-shirt designs.
Because they have many aesthetic details, readability is not a priority for Script fonts. They are bad for website accessibility since people read the words with more effort. Some people are even unable to read words with Script fonts at all.
In addition, it is as important to choose fonts with fewer additional details or decorations. Basic, plain, and simple fonts are easier to read by anyone. Therefore, Sans Serif fonts are the best choices even though Serif fonts like Times New Roman can be used for a website as well.
Some best options from Sans Serif fonts for the website accessibility are Arial, Helvetica, Lucida Sans, Tahoma, and Verdana. They are not only popular and very simple but also elegant, so words from those fonts are both easy and pleasing to be read.
In conclusion, Sans Serif fonts are the most ideal type of fonts for website accessibility. If you are going to write something on your website, it is recommended that you use the popular fonts already installed on your computer.
However, if you want some more aesthetic fonts, you can check the fonts from AQR Studio. There are some beautiful website-friendly fonts to be chosen. Other than that, there are also a lot of other styles of fonts that you can use for your other occasions.
