I’d love to see some extraterrestrial typefaces.

:-), good point conor... roswell maybe?

to quote emigre/licko...

"legibility is not an intrinsic quality of type but something acquired through use"

so, find out what your target group read the most, and then choose a typeface that is close to the majorities characters

my preferences are the older serifs... caslon, garamond, aries... somehow they blend into the background, allowing you to follow the words, rather than noticing the shapes of the text... but that might just be another 'acquired by use' thing

although, if you are using word, you'll be stuck with its 'if i can't find it, i'll use something else anyway' conventions!

I'm guessing you want the most readable serif font in the world when set in English. I'd go with one of the older serifs as well. Maybe Goudy Old Style. Or Baskerville.

And I'd offer the qualification that a word processing application doesn't have the typographic wherewithall to offer the most readable setting.

David, for quite a period of time Caslon had the reputation of being the most readable--for print, of course. Printers said 'When in doubt, use Caslon.' And George Bernard Shaw insisted all his plays be published in Caslon, for readability. The digital versions haven't quite had the magic of the metal versions, though. When my new digital Caslon comes out, I hope people will want to give Caslon the crown again. At least that is my goal.

Of course the screen is a completely different animal...

Pretty hard to beat Baskerville, and you can set just about any subject matter with it. But you need a good cut, such as Storm's.

All the Dr. Seus books are set in Century Schoolbook for legibility...

From what I've read, it's hard to beat Garamond. Personally, I love how Utopia flows.

dberlow: I didn't think there would be a difference between the two in readability, but now I understand that you mean font files that'd work for Mac and not Windows (and the other way around, of course). Being a Windows user, I'd have to say that Windows would be helpful, but fonts for Mac are exciting, too :).

-- David

Georgia for screens in general.

A.

First of all, I see confusion between "legibility" and "readability". Not to oversimplify, legibility is the ability to decipher in adverse conditions, such as poor lighting, fog, visual impairment, etc. The gold standard for legibility ought to be ClearView, which was designed for road signage, and has some impressive research backing it up. Of course, other contenders such as Frutiger are perfectly viable alternatives.

I assume "readability" to mean performance in an immersive reading environment, meaning in a nice long passage of text, in a comfortable chair, with good lighting etc. It's harder to quantify what "performance" even means (unlike a road sign, where you have a good decipher / no decipher test), but I take it to mean the combination of reading speed and comprehension.

The science on readability is sparse in the extreme, but for print, I think it's hard to beat any of the classic metal Monotype (and Lino) faces: Baskerville, Bembo, Sabon, Caledonia. As William points out, Caslon is also very nice, but there are many different cuts, and not all are especially nice, especially the digital ones. Similarly for Garamond. The Harry Potter books are set in the Adobe version, which is pretty good, but I did not like the spacing. Oh, and by the way, for both legibility and readability, spacing is even more important than the shape of the letterforms themselves.

On screen, it starts depending a lot on the rendering technology. Georgia is a pretty good bet, though. On Vista, I think Constantia is likely to be a pleasant and readable font, but I haven't spent enough time with it to say for sure.

Best of luck!

David:
"...I’d have to say that Windows would be helpful,"
So then, what version of windows? and what setting do you normal use in "appearance settings?" and...*

"I understand that you mean font files that’d work for Mac and not Windows..."
and more than that, most who just shout out typeface names, don't perhaps realize it is a font you are looking for ;)

So, I try to get the specification down to a size* or a small range thereof before I make specific recommendations, ever, these daze.

Otherwise, I might say something funny, like, "The Most Readable Serif Font on Earth would have to be Verdana."

Cheers!

Whichever one is biggest.

Within the new group of OpenType typefaces released just recently with Vista and Office2007, I really like Cambria. A _lot_! In some ways, it reminds me of Cheltenham, which I love and have always thought was a great onscreen typeface.

These new fonts were specifically designed for reading onscreen. They have larger, more open counters and less difference between the thinner and thicker strokes (more like Old Style, in this regard).

Nonetheless, I do find the "3 Ls" -- letterspacing, leading, and line length -- to have AS MUCH to do with readability onscreen as font choice.

Point size is an issue too, if you are reading onscreen, because your monitor/display is much lower res than the clarity obtainable in print. I would _hate_ bodycopy larger than 10 point in print, but sometimes even 13 point is easier to read on the computer. Somewhere between 11 and 13 point is often where the thickness of the strokes onscreen "jump" from one-pixel-thick to two-pixels-thick. This threshold has a lot to do with clarity and type color within each paragraph.

And, as was mentioned above, depending on your monitor, ClearType may be a help. Same goes for the font smoothing options in Acrobat Reader. But this is an interaction between the technology and personal taste. I always turn them OFF for small type sizes. YMMV.

> I wonder if the choice has as much to do with the name having “Schoolbook” in it, so the assumption is made that it’s supposed to be more acceptable for beginning readers.

Ah yes, Marketing 101.

>I have Tim oi :)
There are many threads about legibility and readability, and some about dyslexia. Out of interest how do you look up the spelling?

http://www.typophile.com/node/15692

http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=dyslexia+site:typoph...

Tim

Thanks Tim and Don,
Very interesting stuff. as or spelling, I look up words that I can't come close to spelling correctly by doing and associated google search. For example to look up dyslexia I would google reading disability, select site that would list these disabilities and find the spelling I need. It works very well but you need to run the word through the spell check anyway, not everyone has the best editor especially the .org's. We may not be able to spell but we sure can problem solve.

I vote for Times too.

In my opinion, the most readable serif in displaying on screen with MS Word on Windows XP and Smooth font setting on would be Century Schoolbook because of its clear contrast and nice shape. The second rank goes to Georgia, though in print it is a little bold. Third is Times New Roman, I have to admit that it may not be the most beautiful but it is readable at small size on screen even with anti-alaising mode off. Cambria and Segoe Print, which are pre-loaded in Vista are also great.

For Mac OSX, I'd say Adobe Garamond, Hoefler Text and Century Schoolbook are my choice. Baskerville and Caslon as some mentioned earlier that the digital versions may not fully be appreciated as the original but they are still of good quality.

Maybe you might need to compare different typefaces of choice on screen and do some survey on your colleagues to finally decide the winner.

--- pinky winky kinky ---

I wonder if the choice has as much to do with the name having “Schoolbook” in it, so the assumption is made that it’s supposed to be more acceptable for beginning readers.

that's possible, of course. but hopefully not the case. for instance, i think few designers (experienced or otherwise) would choose Century Gothic for a book on castles, despite the name.

Thomas, is this presentation available in some form on line?

My guess is any darker face with a (relatively) large x-height, if we're talking about print.

I think it could be as simple as that, really.