The Great Typeface Debate: Serif or Sans-Serif

I'm far from the first to wrestle with this question, but given its ability to elicit passionate responses, and not being one to shy away from controversy, I thought I'd weigh in.

At the risk of seeming to avoid the question, let me first state that the correct answer is considerably more complex. Arguments can be made either way, and truth be told, I could arguably defend either point-of-view. How? Well, to my mind, typeface choice is only one part of the equation when it comes to issues of readability. At least just as important are the formatting choices, intended audience, final output medium and personal preferences involved.

The Argument for Serif:

The argument for serif dates back to the beginning of the print medium itself (and way earlier than that if one takes into account ancient handwritten scripts and stone carvings). Conventional wisdom has taught for centuries that serif fonts are easier to read, especially with regards to lengthier types of documents such as books, newspapers, magazine articles and so forth. Unfortunately, in terms of quantifiable science, there's no credible evidence to support this point of view.

The Argument for Sans-Serif:

Support for sans-serif really took flight at the dawn of the PC age (early 1980s). Of course, it had been a popular choice before then, but was mainly to be found in large headlines and labels comprised of one or two sentences. With the emergence of monitors as a reading medium, sans-serif fonts were considered friendlier to the eye, especially when one takes into account the rather limited resolutions of the then available technologies such as Videotext and first generation personal computers.

Enter High-Resolution and The Internet:

As display devices improved in the nineties, along with the debut of type-enhancing screen technologies (ex. ClearType), the early consensus supporting sans serif as the preferred typeface of choice (for electronic display devices) became less so. The emergence of the Internet (in the late nineties) as a mainstream vehicle for receiving information further raised the stakes. Amongst early web designers, sans-serif fonts were still the preferred typeface of choice, but not for very long. Fissures began to erupt along a 50/50 split, that pretty much continues to this day.

Consensus Impossible

Younger designers post mid-1990s are more likely to consider sans-serif as their initial typeface of choice, not just for online applications but also for print. Older designers skew more towards the serif side of the fence, but not exclusively so.

Good designers, young or old, quickly come to learn that there is room for both serif and sans-serif in their quiver. Issues pertaining to readability are more apt to be determined by choices such as kerning (the space between individual characters), line space, paragraph settings and the relationship of words to other elements sharing the page (Ex. graphics). Also influencing their choices are the type of audience they are speaking to, the type of product, service or message being spoken about, and a host of other material factors - including plain old personal preference.

In general, I myself prefer the look of sans-serif typefaces (they just feel more progressive to me), but I definitely wouldn't feel comfortable not having the option of serif fonts available to me. My guess is that I speak for a lot of designers in this regard.

In support of this article, I consulted with a number of other other designers and took time to read a large number of essays on the subject (including some very passionate ones backed by all kinds of "scientific" data). I was open to the idea of being swayed by one side or the other, but at the end of the day, it simply didn't happen.

Consensus, it would seem, is simply unattainable at this point in history - at least when it comes to the very broad argument of serif vs. sans-serif.

The next time someone tries to tell you that one type of typeface (serif or sans-serif) is easier to read than the other, take comfort in the knowledge that they likely don't know any better, and most certainly have never stopped to seriously consider all the other elements of typography that enter into the readability argument.