best font for thesis presentation

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Academic Appeal: The 11 Best Fonts for Academic Papers

• BY Bogdan Sandu
• 26 February 2024

Imagine settling into the rhythm of crafting your academic magnum opus—the words flow, ideas chime, yet it all hinges on how your prose meets the reader’s eye. You’re well aware that  the best fonts for academic papers  don’t just whisper to the intellect; they shout to the discerning critic in each evaluator. Here unfolds a narrative, not merely of  typography  but your academic saga’s silent ambassador.

In forging this guide, I’ve honed focus on one pivotal, often underestimated player in the academic arena:  font selection .

Navigate through this roadmap and emerge with a treasure trove of  legible typefaces  and format tips that ensure your paper stands hallmark to clarity and professionalism.

Absorb insights—from the revered  Times New Roman  to the understated elegance of  Arial —paired with indispensable  formatting nuggets  that transcend mere compliance with  university guidelines .

Dive deep, and by article’s end, unlock a dossier of sage advice, setting your documents a class apart in the scrutinous world of academic scrutiny. Here’s to  typography  serving not just as a vessel but as your ally in the scholarly discourse.

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20 Best Fonts for Presentations In 2024 [PowerPoint or Not]

Written by: Chloe West

Choosing the best font for your presentation can mean the difference between an engaged audience and one that’s confused or distracted. A presentation font needs to be legible, agreeable, and not interfere with the content itself.

But choosing a font isn’t always straightforward.

To save you time and effort, we’ve selected 25 of the best fonts for presentations. This list will help you find the best font for your next presentation, whether you’re using PowerPoint, Google Slides, Keynote or any other tool to create it.

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Choose the font that you like from the list below and see when (and if) you should use it. And the best part? Each of these, and 500 more fonts are available for free in Visme's presentation maker .

Here's a short selection of 8 easy-to-edit Presentation templates you can edit, share and download with Visme. View more below:

26 Best Fonts for Presentations 

• Archivo Black
• Libre-Baskerville
• Abril Fatface
• League Spartan
• Playfair Display
• DM Serif Display
• Dela Gothic One

Presentation Font #1: Lato

We’ve all seen a million and two presentations using standard fonts like Arial and Times New Roman. Lato often serves as a default font choice in many cases. This sans-serif typeface offers a more contemporary appearance.

Plus, the variety of weights that Lato is available in – from thin to light to bold and more – helps to ramp up this font’s overall appeal.

This font can be used in a variety of different ways, as we’ll see in the presentation templates below.

In this presentation below, we see Lato used as the header font in each slide. It’s paired with a thicker serif font to create a nice balance between the two types of fonts.

Here’s another presentation example using Lato as the main header. Both of these examples are using Lato Light to create a more sleek and modern look in their slide decks.

However, as we see in the above presentation, Lato’s normal and bold weights work perfectly for offsetting the light in various headings and designs.

Lato is a modern and readable font, making it perfect for nearly any type of presentation. However, it works perfectly for conveying your professionalism in a pitch deck as well, like we’ve shown you in these examples.

Presentation Font #2: Roboto

Another great font to use in your presentations is Roboto. Roboto is yet another basic sans serif font that works across a variety of industries and types of presentations .

Roboto is a suitable font to use for your body text, like we see below in this presentation.

All of the main body paragraphs are easy to read in Roboto, as well as professional and well designed.

We see Roboto used again below in this presentation sharing workout apps.

Here, it’s also used as the main font for body copy within the presentation. This just goes to show that this font can be used for nearly any type of presentation as well as any industry.

Roboto also pairs well with many other fonts, whether a serif like Garamond, a sans serif like Gill Sans or a script like Pacifico.

Presentation Font #3: Bentham

Bentham is a stunning serif font that works perfectly as a header font in your business presentations . It’s easy to read and gives your presentation a more traditional look and feel.

We use the Bentham font in our simple presentation theme, as you can see below.

This font can be used as uppercase, title case or even lowercase, whatever fits in best with the rest of your design. In the simple presentation theme, we have over 300 different slide styles to help you put together a unique and beautiful presentation.

Bentham is a free font that you can easily access inside Visme when creating your presentation design. Add letter spacing to create a different effect on your slides.

Pair Bentham with a sans serif font for your body copy like Open Sans (that we’ll cover shortly) or Futura .

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Presentation Font #4: Fira Sans

Fira Sans is a stunning font that is incredibly versatile. In fact, you can utilize Fira Sans as both your header and body font, with another font in the mix to act only as an accent font.

See what we mean in this PowerPoint template below.

While Fira Sans is used in both normal and bold weights for the majority of the slide content, we see a nice serif thrown in as well to offset the single presentation font.

We can see Fira Sans used in multiple ways in this informational presentation template below as well.

This gorgeous sans serif font can be used in bold, italic, underline and more, giving you a wide variety of uses for this one font selection. Give it a try in your next presentation.

Presentation Font #5: Archivo Black

Archivo Black is a bold and strong font that looks powerful in all caps, like in the presentation example below. This font works perfectly on titles in both large and smaller sizes because it has a heavy presence.

In this presentation, Archivo Black is paired with Work Sans, a perfectly agreeable sans serif font that is easy to read in body text and captions.

When deciding what fonts to pair together, take a look at the Font Pairs collection in the left-hand toolbar of the Visme editor. In there, you’ll find hundreds of great pairings to use in your presentations.

Presentation Font #6: Montserrat

Montserrat is a big favorite of ours here at Visme given that a large majority of our own headings across our website are done in this font.

However, it’s one of the top font choices you can use as well for the headings on your PowerPoint slides.

Check out how we’ve used Montserrat as a header in this marketing plan presentation template.

It’s bold and helps your slide titles and headers to stand out to your audience, letting them know exactly what to expect each time you move to a new slide.

Here’s another example where we’ve used Montserrat, but this time we’ve used a thinner version in the header.

This versatile font almost looks like a completely different typeface when you switch up its weight, giving you even more flexibility for using it across your various presentations.

As you can see, Montserrat can be the font to choose when creating a marketing or business plan presentation as it’s both professional and visually appealing.

Montserrat also pairs well with a variety of different fonts. Try a thin sans serif for a nice contrast in your next PowerPoint.

Presentation Font #7:  Open Sans

Open Sans is a commonly used font for body paragraphs in your presentation slides due to its legibility. Because it’s a basic sans serif font, it’s the perfect way to visualize the larger pieces of text you might need to include on a slide.

Here’s a presentation template that showcases Open Sans as the main font for the body copy.

However, Open Sans shouldn’t be discounted as only a paragraph typeface. In fact, you can also use it in professional presentations to help your headings stand out clearly, increasing readability.

Take a look at this stock pitch presentation that uses Open Sans as the large font for the title and headings on each page. We used Open Sans in two different weights, creating a font pair that looks balanced and unique.

If you’re looking for the right font to ensure your presentation is easy to read and digest, Open Sans is a great choice.

Presentation Font #8: Dosis

Dosis is another go-to presentation font for any industry. It’s a fun sans serif font with rounded edges and tall, thin letters, giving it a more futuristic look.

Here’s an example of how an industry focused presentation can use Dosis in – a slide deck for a restaurant’s marketing plan.

In this example, Dosis is used in all caps on the title slide and in the headings on each slide. This template has added a unique design that incorporates a two-color composition that makes the font contrast with the background.

Below, we have another impressive presentation template using Dosis in a similar fashion. It’s paired here with sans serif font Source Sans Pro, providing a modern combination fit for a tech startup pitch deck.

Similarly, we see that Dosis works well in all caps and can be used in a variety of designs in order to make the text stand out that much more.

Presentation Font #9: Libre-Baskerville

Another quality PowerPoint font to consider using in your presentations is Libre-Baskerville. This is a Google font that you can use for free inside many presentation software , Visme included!

Libre-Baskerville is a serif font style that can be paired with a variety of other fonts and color schemes, creating a more traditional look and feel for your presentation.

We use Libre-Baskerville in all caps as headings in our Modern presentation theme. This theme has over 800 different slide designs so you can pick and choose the ones that work best for your presentation needs.

However, this font can also be used in body paragraphs just as easily, as it’s clear and legible and easy to read.

In the presentation template below, we’ve paired Libre-Baskerville with Josefin Sans in the header, creating a classic look and feel for any presentation deck .

Libre Baskerville is a timeless font choice that never goes out of style and adds a sleek touch to any presentation you need to create.

Presentation Font #10: Muli

Muli is a versatile font that looks professional in both headings and body copy. As a sans-serif font, it’s bottom-heavy, so it sits well on the line, giving a sense of control. Its roundness makes it friendly and easy to read.

This presentation uses Muli for the titles in a medium size and a lower size for small headings. The pairing of Muli with Lato works well with the colors and shapes in the rest of the design.

Presentation Font #11: Abril Fatface

If you’re looking for a bolder font that grabs attention, a slab serif like Abril Fatface might be just the font you’re looking for. This could pair nicely with a standard font like Helvetica or Verdana or a thinner serif like Georgia or Palatino.

Check out how we’ve incorporated this bold font into the headings of the below annual report presentation design.

Abril Fatface is a great font for creating eye-catching headlines on your slides, but should only be used with short headings or pieces of text. A bold font like this can be hard to read in paragraphs or longer sentences.

Look at how good this Abril Fatface looks on the 3rd slide of this presentation.

The presentation below also uses Abril Fatface for the headings on each slide. The font has so much personality that it looks beautiful on its own and placed over bold colors.

If you’re looking for a slab serif font alternative, use fonts like Rockwell or a bolded Trocchi in your next Visme or PowerPoint presentation .

You could even look into custom fonts from sites like DaFont and import them into your Visme brand kit .

Presentation Font #12:  KoHo

The next font on our list is KoHo, a unique sans serif font that can be used in more playful presentations. 

Whether you’re creating a presentation for school , a video presentation to play in your office or something else entirely, KoHo can be one of the best fonts to utilize.

We incorporated KoHo into our Creative presentation theme in the various headings of each slide.

This is another one of our massive presentation themes, offering hundreds of slide designs for you to choose from. However, as the name suggests, this one has a more creative and playful feel to it.

If you need to create a pitch deck for investors or a sales presentation for new clients, KoHo and the Creative theme might not be for you. 

However, if you’re embedding a slideshow onto your blog or sharing an informational presentation on SlideShare, KoHo could be a better suited choice to engage your audience.

Presentation Font #13: Helvetica 

Helvetica is a classic sans serif font that has a very loyal fanbase, and for good reason.

As seen most clearly in capitalized texts, the upper half of the texts are quite large when compared to other san serifs fonts. 

This allows the Helvetica fonts to have near-symmetrical proportionality when measuring the upper and lower portions of a text. These proportions make the identification of letters easier at a distance, like in the template example above. 

This fact makes Helvetica a great font to use for headers and titles in live presentations where there may be people “sitting in the back row ” and viewing your presentation from a distance. 

To clearly communicate your main points, be sure to use Helvetica as a bold text on headings and titles.

Presentation Font #14: Cormorant

Cormorant is a sleek and modern serif font.

We like to think of Cormorant as a good alternative for Times New Roman but with a moderate and tasteful change.

With a dynamic range of varying thicknesses, Cormorant appears to have a calligraphic feel and look while still maintaining a sense of professionalism.

While artistic and expressive, Cormorant is still fully legible and usable in a professional environment, as you can see in this presentation template.

Our recommendation is that you choose a font color that is a complementary color to the background. This helps separate the thin portions of the font from the background.

Should the variations in thickness prove too much for your taste, consider dialing back that expression by using Cormorant in its bold format. By thickening up the thinner lines, the variations are less noticeable and may be more suitable for a given context. 

Cormorant is a modern serif font that works well in titles, headings, subtitles for subpoints or paragraphs.

Presentation Font #15: Prompt

Prompt is a geometric sans serif font designed for Latin and Thai languages. Its geometric quality gives it a solid and stable feel that will give your presentation a unique look.

In this modern presentation example, Prompt appears in all titles and subheadings. It’s paired with Montserrat, another san serif with personality. These fonts together do look a bit similar to each other but balance each other out in terms of weight and thickness.

Choose this font specifically if you’re creating a presentation in Thai and need the words to be legible and well-balanced.

Presentation Font #16: League Spartan

League Spartan is a simple sans serif font, that is bold, uniform and minimalistic by nature and is great for headings and titles.

Because it's hefty even with the bold setting turned off, you may want to take extra precautions when using League Spartan for paragraphs or letter bodies. 

League Spartan works great as a header for infographics or cartoon-style presentations, like in the template above. 

The purpose of an infographic is to take difficult or complex information and turn it into easy-to-remember points. The reason that League Spartan works so well with infographics is its simplicity. 

To help set the overall tone of an infographic, you can use a simplified san serif font like League Spartan. A font like this will simplify an important or complex data point and make it feel easy to understand. 

Presentation Font #17: Poppins

Poppins is a versatile and linear san serif font. 

Poppins is linear because of its strong vertical terminals, which are the end of a stroke that is not a serif. This gives the font a sense of weight and vertical authority, making it great for strong, stand-out titles and headers.

Not only is Poppins a wonderful choice for titles and headers, but it also works well for titles, text bodies and subtitles, as you can see in our presentation template below. 

The linear and versatile aspects of Poppins has made this font a favorite in the business and professional world. It feels casual, yet is still very professional.

Presentation Font #18: Playfair Display

What can we say about Playfair Display, other than it’s an incredibly chic and fashionable serif font. 

This font has a strong box feel as most of the characters stay between the baseline and X-height. This means that most of the letters do not dip far below the line, nor do they rise above most of the other letters.

This makes Playfair Display an excellent choice for strong titles and headers, as you can see in our presentation template below.

Many fonts that go after the “box look” fail at being legible from a distance. 

To avoid this problem and make the letters more pronounced, Playfair Display uses a variety of thicknesses in the stem of their letters when compared to the arms and other extensions. 

Playfair display is a classy and elegant font designed to be used as headers or titles. While it can still be used in paragraphs, you may want to limit its usage to shorter portions of your text.

Similarly sized and spaced words written in this style can be disorienting for some readers. So instead, consider using Playfair Display as a font for titles, quotes or various subtitles in your presentation.

Presentation Font #19: Raleway

Raleway is a modern sans serif font that was originally designed to be used as a lightweight font. But after its release and by popular demand, Raleway was given heavier and italicized versions for its fans to use. 

The bold and light versions of this font are extremely versatile and can be used anywhere from bold headers to lighter parts of the body in your presentations, as you can see in our presentation template below.

The italicized version of Raleway has slightly off-centered bowls and shoulders in certain letters. This means that the markings that are not the stem are purposefully written higher or lower than normal. 

This is a subtle artistic flair that does not influence readability. Some people find that swashes actually help increase legibility with these off-centered markings. 

Presentation Font #20: Otama

This type of font pairs well with a solid sans serif like Lato Light. In this presentation example, Otama and Lato Light in all caps work together to create a professional design that stands out and makes a statement.

Presentation Font #21: Lora

Lora is a unique serif font that was made in a contemporary style. 

Drawing its inspiration from calligraphy and traditional fonts, Lora is an excellent balance between an artistic and professional font. 

Lora has very pronounced arches leaping away from the stem of each letter. This gives the font family a more “bubbly” feel to it, while still maintaining a sense of clean professionalism.

To unleash Lora’s true artistic nature, you’ll want to turn on the italics. When italics mode is activated, each letter receives additional swashes, giving it a more hand-written feel.

If you add weight to its default thickness, Lora works well for both titles and headers and when set to its default settings, Lora truly shines as a font in paragraphs and bodies, as you can see in our presentation template below.

Presentation Font #22: Inter

You can use Inter in different weights throughout a presentation or pair it with a versatile font like Lato Light to give the composition a bit of visual variety. The presentation example below uses Inter in mixed-case and Lato Light in all-caps for headings and mixed-case for body text.

Presentation Font #23: Noto Sans

Noto Sans is a basic sans serif font that makes for a great presentation font. Clean and easy to read, it can be used in a variety of different ways from slide to slide.

Take a look at this presentation template below. The main font used throughout the headers and content is Noto Sans, creating a clean and cohesive presentation design.

The above presentation template also uses a script font for the author name on the first slide as well as another sans serif font (Poppins) for some body content.

Having a nice mixture between the two ensures the presentation isn't boring—but it's still clean and uncluttered. Poppins is another font on this list. Try mixing 2-3 different fonts from our recommended fonts to create a stunning presentation design.

Presentation Font #24: Heebo

Heebo is one of the more unique sans serif fonts on our list, but it works perfectly for presentation slide headers. As a thin, tall font, it works better in a larger size than it would for content.

Take a look at how we've used Heebo in this presentation template below. It remains in an all-caps format, typically for headers from slide to slide.

We've also creatively used the font by juxtaposing it atop purple squares, helping to create a design element out of text. Consider how you can do the same thing in your presentations.

Presentation Font #25: DM Serif Display

Our next top font is a beautifully bold serif font. DM Serif Display is a perfect header font for a more traditional presentation design. Serifs tend to seem more old-fashioned, so keep that in mind when creating your next presentation. Maybe a serif will best fit with your audience.

Take a look at this template below to see DM Serif Display in action.

In the above presentation, we've paired this bold serif font with a nice thin sans serif to pull the design together. Sometimes opposites attract and help you to create a beautiful presentation design that your audience will love.

Presentation Font #26: Dela Gothic One

Dela Gothic One is a thick and chunky font with a strong feel. It’s ideal for headings on posters, packaging and in titles on presentations. This font has a lot of power and is best paired with a simple sans serif font or even a classic serif like Garamond for body copy.

For a bolder outcome, use Dela Gothic One in all caps, like we did in the presentation example below. Each slide includes a strong title in Dela Gothic One in a color that contrasts with the background.

Ready to Create Your Next Presentation?

When it comes to fonts for PowerPoint (or any other presentation platform), there are so many options to choose from that it can get overwhelming. But selecting fonts doesn't need to stress you out. Stick to the ones in this list and you’re sure to have a winner.

Whether you use Microsoft PowerPoint , Apple Keynote or Visme, each of these presentation fonts can really bring the best out of your presentation. 

If you want to get even more out of your presentation design and have access to top notch animation, transition and interactivity capabilities, sign up for Visme's free presentation maker today .

If you're racing against the clock, take advantage of Visme’s AI features, like the AI Presentation Maker which takes a text prompt and turns it into a fully designed presentation draft.

Create beautiful presentations faster with Visme.

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Chloe West is the content marketing manager at Visme. Her experience in digital marketing includes everything from social media, blogging, email marketing to graphic design, strategy creation and implementation, and more. During her spare time, she enjoys exploring her home city of Charleston with her son.

What font should I choose for my thesis?

This post is by DrJanene Carey, a freelance writer and editor based in Armidale NSW. She occasionally teaches academic writing at the University of New England and often edits academic theses, articles and reports. Her website is http://www.janenecarey.com

Arguably, this question is a classic time waster and the student who poses it should be told to just get on with writing up their research. But as someone who edits theses for a living, I think a bit of time spent on fonts is part of the process of buffing and polishing what is, after all, one of the most important documents you will ever produce. Just bear in mind that there is no need to immerse yourself so deeply in the topic that you start quibbling about whether it’s a font or a typeface that you are choosing .

Times New Roman is the standard choice for academic documents, and the thesis preparation guidelines of some universities stipulate its use. For many years, it was the default body text for Microsoft Word. With the release of Office 2007, the default became a sans serif typeface called Calibri. Lacking the little projecting bits (serifs) at the end of characters makes Calibri and its many friends, such as Arial, Helvetica and Verdana, look smoother and clearer on a screen, but generally makes them less readable than a serif typeface when used for printed text . The other problem with choosing a sans serif for your body text is that if you want passages in italics (for example, lengthy participant quotes) often this will be displayed as slanted letters, rather than as a true italic font.

You would like your examiners to feel as comfortable as possible while their eyes are traversing the many, many pages of your thesis, so maximising legibility and readability is a good idea. Times New Roman is ubiquitous and familiar, which means it is probably the safest option, but it does have a couple of drawbacks. Originally designed for The Times in London, its characters are slightly narrowed, so that more of them can be squished into a newspaper column. Secondly, some people intensely dislike TNR because they think it has been overused, and regard it as the font you choose when you are not choosing a font .

If you do have the luxury of choice (your university doesn’t insist you use Times New Roman, and you have defined document styles that are easy to modify, and there’s enough time left before the submission deadline) then I think it is worth considering what other typefaces might work well with your thesis. I’m not a typographical expert, but I have the following suggestions.

• Don’t use Calibri, or any other sans serif font, for your body text, though it is fine for headings. Most people agree that dense chunks of printed text are easier to read if the font is serif, and examiners are likely to expect a typeface that doesn’t stray too far from the standard. To my eye, Calibri looks a little too casual for the body of a thesis.
• Typefaces like Garamond, Palatino, Century Schoolbook, Georgia, Minion Pro, Cambria and Constantia are all perfectly acceptable, and they come with Microsoft Word. However, some of them (Georgia and Constantia, for example) feature non-lining numerals, which means that instead of all sitting neatly on the base line, some will stand higher or lower than others, just like letters do. This looks nice when they are integrated with the text, but it is probably not what you want for a tabular display.
• Consider using a different typeface for your headings. It will make them more prominent, which enhances overall readability because the eye scanning the pages can quickly take in the hierarchy of ideas. The easiest way to get a good contrast with your serif body text is to have sans serif headings. Popular combinations are Garamond/Helvetica; Minion Pro/Myriad Pro; Times New Roman/Arial Narrow. But don’t create a dog’s breakfast by having more than two typefaces in your thesis – use point sizes, bold and italics for variety.

Of late, I’ve become quite fond of Constantia. It’s an attractive serif typeface that came out with Office 2007 at the same time as Calibri, and was specifically designed to look good in print and on screen. Increasingly, theses will be read in PDF rather than book format, so screen readability is an important consideration.  Asked to review Microsoft’s six new ClearType fonts prior to their release, typographer Raph Levien said Constantia was likely to be everyone’s favourite, because ‘Even though it’s a highly readable Roman font departing only slightly from the classical model, it still manages to be fresh and new.’

By default, Constantia has non-lining numerals, but from Word 2010 onwards you can set them to be lining via the advanced font/number forms option, either throughout your document or in specific sections, such as within tables.

Here is an excerpt from a thesis, shown twice with different typefaces. The first excerpt features Calibri headings with Constantia body text, and the second has that old favourite, Times New Roman. As these examples have been rendered as screenshots, you will get a better idea of how the fonts actually look if you try them on your own computer and printer.

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The Thesis Whisperer is written by Professor Inger Mewburn, director of researcher development at The Australian National University . New posts on the first Wednesday of the month. Subscribe by email below. Visit the About page to find out more about me, my podcasts and books. I'm on most social media platforms as @thesiswhisperer. The best places to talk to me are LinkedIn , Mastodon and Threads.

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12 Best Fonts For Powerpoint Presentations in 2024

Conference room office people By  Flashvector

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Microsoft Powerpoint can be a very helpful tool for many things such as creating slideshows, conducting presentations, and sharing information with others. Powerpoint allows users to add various features by using special effects, animations, transition effects,  fills in shapes, and much more. Because of its versatility, it has become the go-to professional presentation tool. To add to that, there are a lot of fonts and templates that you can use when in a Powerpoint presentation.

A good Powerpoint presentation is clear, consistent, and compelling, and whether you’ll be conducting a sales pitch, briefing, demo, or report, your choice and use of fonts will greatly affect the quality of your presentation.

Here are some of the best Powerpoint presentation fonts that you can use to blow away your audience, as you kick-off 2022:

How to Choose the Best Font for a Presentation

When choosing the best font for Powerpoint presentations, you have to prioritize readability and legibility to preserve the quality of your content and ensure that your message will be easily understood by your audience. Here are some tips:

1. Choose a Simple Font

Complicated fonts such as script and decorative fonts can make your design look cluttered and make it hard for your audience to read what’s on your slides. Simple fonts like serif or sans serif fonts are ideal because they are easy to read and they blend well with any kind of design.

2. Go for Sans Serif Fonts over Serif Fonts

If you have to make a choice between a serif or classic sans serif font, pick the latter. A sans serif typeface has better readability on-screen. Letterforms with serifs or additional strokes at the end of a character can sometimes look blurred on-screen, which can confuse or distract your audience and make it difficult for them to read.

3. Choose a Font That Looks Great at Both Big and Small Presentation Font Sizes

The best practice for a Powerpoint presentation is to use presentation font sizes no lower than 24 points. To maximize readability, it is important to choose a font that is not too thin nor too thick. Choose a font that will retain its clarity and quality whether it is scaled up to 120 points or down to 24 points.

4. Choose a Different Font for Your Titles and Headings

Your body font should be different from your title, heading, and subheading fonts to put proper emphasis on them and create variety and visual interest in your presentation , but remember not to use more than 4 fonts for a cohesive and visually organized design. They should also be in bold and have a bigger font size.

5. Choose Fonts That Complement Each Other

Create balance in your design and promote seamless transitions between sections of your content by choosing the perfect font pairings. Combining serif fonts are usually the best way to go. These fonts can definitely stand on their own, but they work better when they are put together.

6. Consider the Content and Tone of Your Presentation

When picking presentation fonts or trying to choose between a serif font or sans serif font for your Powerpoint, it’s important to think about content and tone. Fonts all have their own associations and “personalities.” Times New Roman is classic, for example, while a simple sans serif font like Gill Sans is more sleek and modern. Try to match the feel of the font with the nature of your Powerpoint.

Best Fonts to Use for Powerpoint

Find the best font to use for your Powerpoint presentation from Creative Market’s top presentation font picks:

1. Pelicano: Basic Sans Serif Font

This easy-to-read, monoline typeface has a simple and clean look that can give your Powerpoint presentation a more casual and approachable vibe, similar to other sans serif classics, like Gill Sans. It also has a great stroke weight that is ideal for adding colors that will draw attention to your text. Take advantage of this feature by incorporating your brand colors for better brand recognition.

2. TT Rircordi Greto: Non-Contrasting Sans Serif

Inspired by the Basilica di Santa Croce in Florence, TT Ricordi Greto is a modern sans serif font with a classic look and feel. It comes in big and small caps which makes way for the dynamic proportions and low contrast between characters. It also has a hint of a serif font style at the terminals that further contributes to its stylistic design, making it a terrific slab serif font alternative. With bold and heavy strokes, this professional-looking font is perfect for your titles and headings.

3. Coolvetica

This basic font features a playful spin on the popular sans serif fonts, Helvetica to produce an iconic and versatile font that you can use not just for formal, professional presentations but for creative designs as well. Coolvetica has 35 distinct and varied styles with 4 weights ranging from extra light to bold and heavy, which means you can use it for titles, headings, subheadings, and body text and it won’t look like the same font at all.

4. Jumper: Modern Serif Font

Like Coolvetica, this font can also be your all-in-one presentation font. Its bold and black variations with powerfully thick strokes can help you create attention-grabbing titles and headers while the thin and regular styles can make the rest of your text optimally readable and visually appealing. Jumper is an example of a geometric font which uses simple geometric shapes that make way for a softer, less robotic look.

5. Think Sans: A Varied Width Font

Think Sans is an all-caps, monoline font that comes in 4 styles with fun alternates that have varying set widths, ranging from a thin sans serif to a much wider alternative. It is a unique typeface that has rounded inner corners complemented by sharp outer corners and pairs wide and narrow characters to create eye-catching, irregularly-shaped text. This font has the right thickness for both your subheadings and body text and can even add a creative touch to your subheadings.

6. Cosmopolis: Sans Serif Font Family

From thin to extended bold, Cosmopolis font family comes in 24 rich styles that are perfect for giving your presentation a modern and sophisticated look. Similar to other sans serif fonts, some of its notable characteristics are a wide set width, tight kerning, and great x-height. This font can help you create strong titles and distinguishable headings as well as keep your body text looking neat and organized for the most beautiful presentations .

7. Maine: Book Antiqua

Moving on to presentation fonts, here’s a clean and modern font based on the roman typeface, Book Antiqua. If you want to give a professional, no-nonsense impression in your presentation, this font is the one you’re looking for. Maine is specially designed for creating more legible body text. Thanks to its clear features, high x-height, and overall simple design, this font has great readability and can easily be paired with other standard, classic fonts.

8. Isabella Grand

With style and grace, the Isabella Grand typeface is an elegant serif font that has relatively thin yet bold strokes that can give you highly readable and legible body text for your presentation. It comes in two styles; the italic style is dreamy and sultry – the perfect partner for the more serious regular style. It also has diagonal crossbars, prominent ball terminals, plus some beautiful ligatures that only accentuate its unique charm.

9. Madley: A Slab Serif Typeface

This clean-looking and beautiful font is called Madley, a contemporary slab serif typeface with monolinear stems, elongated block serifs, and teardrop terminals. From a dainty hairline weight to a thick black weight, this font family has various styles that you can use either as an accent font for your titles and headings or as your main text font.

10. BD Megalona

A modern and elegant revival of the classic Times New Roman font, BD Megalona comes in 26 styles with thin to black weights and advanced OpenType features such as stylistic alternates, swashes, ligatures, and more. Give your presentation and stylish, luxurious, and professional look by using this font to create clear body text and high-impact titles:

11. Montas: Display Serif Family

Here is a contemporary and bold font that is perfect for formal presentations. Montas has stylish features such as wide and narrow strokes, tall lowercase letters, and counters with diagonal stress. Its bolder weights are suitable for creating striking titles and headers, while the lighter weights will make great paragraph typeface.

12. Birchfield Typeface

Finally, custom fonts are a great way to combine and utilize the best features of two or even three different fonts. A great example is this spur serif font that’s made to look like a sans with its almost unnoticeable serifs. Birchield is an all-caps font with an elongated appearance that improves readability. It can be used for your headings or subheadings. Channeling a vintage aesthetic, this font can give your presentation a timeless look.

How to Apply Fonts to Your Powerpoint Presentation?

After selecting the perfect presentation fonts for your next Powerpoint, you’ll want to know how to apply them. Fortunately, the process for selecting and applying any font, whether it be a script font, popular sans serif font, or even a completely custom font, is quite simple.

Here’s how it’s done, step by step:

• Highlight the text you want to change into a new design style. You can do this by simply dragging over it with your left mouse button held down to highlight the text. Or, to adjust the font across numerous slides, hold the “Ctrl” key and click on the Powerpoint slides you want to change.
• Access the font dialog box by going to the “Home” tab and then clicking the little arrow in the lower right-hand corner of the “Font” menu. To access the box even faster and more conveniently, just press the “Ctrl” and “D” keys together.
• Select the right font from the list provided to apply it to the select text or Powerpoint slides. Note that you can also take this time to adjust the font size, color, and even add effects (like an italicized version of your font). Check out the “Sample” area to see how it’ll look.
• Last but not least, click the “OK” button to confirm your new presentation font selection.

Using Custom Presentation Fonts and Themes

The above tutorial shows you how to change to other fonts on the fly when working in Powerpoint. But what if you make a lot of presentations and want to use the best fonts Powerpoint each and every time, without having to manually change them over and over? Luckily, there’s a workaround for that, as you can set up your own themes or templates to use for all your future presentations.

Here’s how it’s done:

• Head to the “View” tab and select “Slide Master.”
• Select “Fonts,” followed by “Customize Fonts.”
• In the “Create New Theme Fonts” box, choose the fonts you’d like to use for your headings and body text.
• Type in a name for your new theme, then click the Save button.
• Via the “Slide Master” box, you can also customize colors and effects,
• Click “Save Current Theme” to save your theme for future use.
• The next time you want to use that theme and load in the best font selections for your presentation, open the “Design” tab and select your saved theme from the gallery.

What Makes the Best Fonts for Powerpoint so Effective?

There are so many different fonts out there, and not all fonts are the same. The best presentation fonts have a certain air about them. They elevate Powerpoint presentations, making the content more engaging and the text more easily readable, too. That’s why many of them tend to stand out for their legibility, pleasant aesthetics, and unique ability to both stand out without drawing attention away from other parts of the presentation, like images and graphs.

Basically, using a quality Powerpoint font can help you fulfill the purpose of your presentation. Hope to see you give these Powerpoint fonts a try before the year ends!

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What kind of fonts can I use for academic presentation? [closed]

Many videos and documents say that we should use Arial as the font for academic presentation. However, I think Arial is really ugly.

Certainly, there are other fonts suitable for academic presentations. How can I recognise them? Is it just every sans-serif font or what do I need to consider?

• presentation

• 4 This is probably to some extent a matter of taste. But for all things concerning academic design and layout, Edward Tufte is a classical go-to reference. –  henning no longer feeds AI Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 20:40
• 4 If your presentation is not about fonts, any boring font is suitable. –  Anonymous Physicist Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 20:50
• 5 Not Comic Sans. –  Captain Emacs Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 20:53
• 3 One advantage of a hideously ugly font is that you will know if someone swipes your slides and posts them online! ;-) –  Ed V Commented Aug 23, 2021 at 21:21

I take it as given that you won’t use typefaces that are not suitable for an academic setting at all, like a comic or blackletter typeface, i.e., any typeface you that is not suitable for a printed poster either. With those constraints, the main thing to consider is that your typeface must render well on a projector or via screencast. Interestingly, those different settings lead to similar conclusions:

You have to expect that projectors have low resolutions (and no sub-pixel hinting ), which causes intricate details such as most serifs look ugly.

For screencasts, you have to expect that they will be scaled on the viewer’s side, which again causes problems with detailed components such as most serifs and works bests with straight lines and similar.

For this reason, most sans-serif typefaces are well suited for presentations while serif typefaces are not. However you can find exceptions such as organic grotesques, which are sans serif but scale badly and render badly on low resolutions – or slab serifs, which work well with scaling as well as on low resolutions.

• Does anyone know the name of the four example fonts in this answer? (Especially the two "good" examples) –  Caleb Stanford Commented Jan 30, 2022 at 0:56
• 2 @6005: The fonts from top to bottom are: Aakar, Ubuntu, Linux Biolinum and Zilla Slab. However, please note that I chose them for highlighting the aspects relevant to this answer, and not to endorse (or attack) these particular fonts. –  Wrzlprmft ♦ Commented Jan 30, 2022 at 9:35
• Thank you! Understood yes –  Caleb Stanford Commented Jan 30, 2022 at 13:24

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged presentation formatting .

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14 Fonts That Make Your PowerPoint Presentations Stand Out

Presentation fonts, more generally known as typography , are one of the most neglected areas of presentation design .

That’s because when presentation fonts are used appropriately and correctly, they blend so well with the overall design that your audience doesn’t even notice it. Yet, when your font usage is lacking, this sticks out like a sore thumb. 

Over 30 million PowerPoint presentations are made daily. Therefore, when it comes to creating your own slide decks, you need to take every advantage you can get to make it stand out. Among other design choices, choosing the best fonts for presentations can provide a huge impact with minimal effort.

In fact, it’s one of the reasons why Steve Jobs was able to turn Apple into the brand it is today. His expertise in branding and design was fueled by the Calligraphy classes that he attended in his early years. This allowed him to find the best font family that accentuated his company’s brand and identity.

So no matter the subject of your PowerPoint presentation, the best font or font family will help you create a lasting impression and convey a powerful message. To help you shine through your next slideshow, here’s our cultivated list of the best fonts for presentations.

If you want to create a PowerPoint presentation but don’t have access to PowerPoint itself, you can use Piktochart’s presentation maker to create a presentation or slide deck and export it as a .ppt file.

Best Fonts for Presentations and PowerPoint

Before we proceed, you should know some basics of typography, especially the difference between Serif, Sans Serif, Script, and Decorative types of fonts. 

Serif Fonts

These are classic fonts recognizable by an additional foot (or tail) where each letter ends. Well-known Serif fonts include:

• Times New Roman
• Century 

Sans Serif Fonts

Differing from the Serif font style, Sans Serif fonts do not have a tail. The most popular Sans Serif font used in presentations is Arial, but other commonly employed renditions of Sans Serif typeface include:

• Century Gothic
• Lucida Sans

Script and Decorative Fonts

These are the fonts that emulate handwriting—not typed with a keyboard or typewriter. Script typefaces and decorative or custom fonts for PowerPoint vary immensely and can be created by a graphic designer to ensure these custom fonts are bespoke to your company/brand.

With these font fundamentals explained, you can also keep up-to-date with the popularity of such fonts using Google’s free font analytics tool here . Let’s now go ahead with our list of the best presentation fonts for your PowerPoint slides. 

• Libre-Baskerville

Keep in mind that you don’t have to stick with only a single font for your slides. You could choose two of the best fonts for your presentation, one for your headings and another for the copy in the body of the slides.

Without further ado, let’s dive into the 14 best presentation fonts.

1. Helvetica

Helvetica is a basic Sans Serif font with a loyal user base. Originally created in 1957 , Helvetica comes from the Latin word for ‘Switzerland’ where it was born. When you use Helvetica, the top-half part of the text is bigger than in other Sans Serif fonts. For this reason, letters and numbers have a balanced proportionality between the top and bottom segments. As a result, this standard font makes it easier to identify characters from a distance.

As a result of being one of the easiest typecases to read compared to different presentation fonts, Helvetica is great for communicating major points as titles and subheadings in a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation.

For these reasons, Helvetica is a popular choice for anyone creating posters .

If you are presenting live to a large group of people, Helvetica is your new go-to font! The classic Sans Serif font is tried and tested and ensures the legibility of your slide deck, even for the audience members sitting at the very back. Though it looks good in any form, you can make Helvetica shine even more in a bold font style or all caps. 

Futura is one of the popular Sans Serif fonts and is based on geometric shapes. Its features are based on uncomplicated shapes like circles, triangles, and rectangles. In other words , it mimics clean and precise proportions instead of replicating organic script or handwriting. Futura is a great default font for presentations because of its excellent readability, elegance, and lively personality. 

As one of many standard fonts designed to invoke a sense of efficiency and progress, Futura is best employed when you want to project a modern look and feel in your presentation. Futura is a versatile option ideal for use in both titles and body content, accounting for why it has remained immensely popular since 1927. 

3. Rockwell

The Rockwell font has strong yet warm characters that make it suitable for a variety of presentation types, regardless of whether it’s used in headings or the body text. However, best practice dictates that this standard font should be used in headers and subheadings based on its geometric style. Rockwell is a Geometric Slab Serif , otherwise known as a slab serif font alternative. It is formed almost completely of straight lines, flawless circles, and sharp angles. This Roman font features a tall x-height and even stroke width that provides its strong presence with a somewhat blocky feel.

Monoline and geometric, Rockwell is a beautiful font that can display any text in a way that looks impactful and important. Whether you want to set a mood or announce a critical update or event, you can’t go wrong with this robust font.

Verdana is easily a great choice as one of the top PowerPoint presentation fonts. Its tall lowercase letters and wide spaces contribute significantly towards boosting slide readability even when the text case or font size is small. That’s why Verdana is best for references, citations, footnotes, disclaimers, and so on. Additionally, it can also be used as a body font to extrapolate on slide headings to nail down your key points.

Besides that, it is one of the most widely available fonts, compatible with both Mac and Windows systems. This makes this modern Sans Serif font a safe bet for when you are not certain where and how will you be delivering your presentation. 

Raleway is a modern and lightweight Sans Serif font. Its italicized version has shoulders and bowls in some letters that are a bit off-centered. What this means is that the markings excluding the stem are intentionally lower or higher as compared to other fonts. 

This gives Raleway a slightly artistic look and feels without impacting its readability (and without falling into the custom or decorative fonts category). In fact, many professionals think the swashes and markings actually enhance the font’s readability and legibility. Moreover, Raleway also has a bold version which is heavily used in presentations and slide decks. 

The bottom line is that Raleway is a versatile typeface that can be used in a variety of presentations, either in the body copy or in titles and subheadings. When the titles are capitalized or formatted as bold, captivating your audience becomes a breeze. 

6. Montserrat

Montserrat is one of our favorite PowerPoint fonts for presentation titles and subheadings. The modern serif font is bold, professional, and visually appealing for when you want your headers and titles to really capture the audience’s attention.

Every time you move to the next slide, the viewers will see the headings and instantly understand its core message.  

Another major quality of the Montserrat font is its adaptability and versatility. Even a small change, such as switching up the weight, gives you an entirely different-looking typeface. So you get enough flexibility to be able to use the font in all types of PowerPoint presentations.

Montserrat pairs nicely with a wide range of other fonts. For example, using it with a thin Sans Serif in body paragraphs creates a beautiful contrast in your PowerPoint slides. For this reason, it is usually the first modern Serif font choice of those creating a business plan or marketing presentation in MS PowerPoint. 

Roboto is a simple sans-serif font that is a good fit for PowerPoint presentations in a wide range of industries. Well-designed and professional, Roboto works especially well when used for body text, making your paragraphs easy to read.

Roboto combines beautifully with several other fonts. When you’re using Roboto for body text, you can have headings and titles that use a script font such as Pacifico, a serif font such as Garamond, or a Sans Serif font such as Gill Sans. 

Bentham is a radiant serif font perfectly suited for headings and subtitles in your PowerPoint slides. It gives your presentation a traditional appearance, and its letter spacing makes your content really easy to read.

You can use this font in uppercase, lowercase, or title case, depending on how it blends with the rest of your slide. For best results, we recommend combining Bentham with a Sans Serif font in your body content. For example, you can use a font such as Open Sans or Futura for the rest of your slide content.

9. Libre-Baskerville

Libre-Baskerville is a free serif Google font. You can pair this classic font with several other fonts to make a PowerPoint presentation with a traditional design. 

One of its best features is that it works equally well in both headings and body copy. It’s clear and easily readable, no matter how you use it. And when used for headings, it works really well in uppercase form. 

Tahoma is one of the fonts that offer the best level of clarity for PowerPoint slides. It has easily distinguishable characters like Verdana, but with the exception of tight spacing to give a more formal appearance.

Designed particularly for screens, Tahoma looks readable on a variety of screen sizes and multiple devices. In fact, this significant aspect is what makes Tahoma stand out from other fonts in the Sans Serif family. 

11. Poppins

Poppins falls within the Sans Serif font category but is a different font of its own uniqueness. The solid vertical terminals make it look strong and authoritative. That’s why it’s great for catchy titles and subheadings, as well as for the body paragraphs. Poppins is a geometric typeface issued by Indian Type Foundry in 2014. It was released as open-source and is available in many font sizes for free on Google Fonts.

When you want something that feels casual and professional in equal measure, pick Poppins should be in the running for the best PowerPoint fonts. 

12. Gill Sans 

Gill Sans is another classic presentation font for when you’re looking to build rapport with your audience. Gill Sans is a friendly and warm Sans Serif font similar to Helvetica. At the same time, it looks strong and professional. 

It’s designed to be easy to read even when used in small sizes or viewed from afar. For this reason, it’s a superior match for headers, and one of the best PowerPoint fonts, especially when combined with body text using Times New Roman or Georgia (not to mention several other fonts you can pair it with for successful results). This is the right font for combing different fonts within a presentation.

13. Palatino

Palatino can be classified as one of the oldest fonts inspired by calligraphic works of the 1940s. This old-style serif typeface was designed by Hermann Zapf and originally released in 1948 by the Linotype foundry. It features smooth lines and spacious counters, giving it an air of elegance and class. 

Palatino was designed to be used for headlines in print media and advertising that need to be viewable from a distance. This attribute makes Palatino a great font suitable for today’s PowerPoint presentations.   

Palatino is also a viable choice for your presentation’s body text. It’s a little different from fonts typically used for body paragraphs. So it can make your presentation content stand out from those using conventional fonts. 

14. Georgia

Georgia typeface has a modern design that few fonts can match for its graceful look. It’s similar to Times New Roman but with slightly larger characters. Even in small font size, Georgia exudes a sense of friendliness; a sense of intimacy many would claim has been eroded from Times New Roman through its overuse. This versatile font was designed by Matthew Carter , who has successfully composed such a typeface family which incorporates high legibility with personality and charisma. Its strokes form Serif characters with ample spacing, making it easily readable even in small sizes and low-resolution screens. 

Another benefit of using this modern font is its enhanced visibility, even when it’s used in the background of your PowerPoint slides. Moreover, the tall lowercase letters contribute to a classic appearance great for any PowerPoint presentation.  

Final Step: Choosing Your Best Font for Presentations

Choosing the right PowerPoint fonts for your future presentations is more of a creative exercise than a scientific one. Unless you need to abide by strict branding guidelines and company policies, there are no rules for the ‘best font’ set in stone. Plus, presentation fonts depend entirely on the environment or audience it is intended for, the nature and format of the project, and the topic of your PowerPoint presentation. 

However, there are certain basic principles rooted in typography that can help you narrow down the evergrowing list of available PowerPoint presentation fonts and choose PowerPoint fonts that will resonate with and have a powerful impact on your target audience.

As discussed in this article, these include font factors such as compatibility with most systems, clarity from a distance, letter spacing, and so on. Luckily for you, our carefully researched and compiled list of best fonts for presentations above was created with these core fundamentals already in mind, saving you time and hassle.

As long as you adopt these best practices for standard fonts without overcomplicating your key message and takeaways, you’ll soon be on your way to designing a brilliant slide deck using a quality PowerPoint font or font family! From all of us here at Piktochart, good luck with your new and improved presentation slides that will surely shine!

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What is the best font for Thesis presentation? 10 Best Fonts

You are probably wondering if your panel will judge your presentation based on the font used. Selecting the best font for thesis presentation is as essential as your thesis content. A good font has a sizable effect on how your thesis is perceived and received. Great fonts assist you in acing your thesis defense and add a professional touch to your thesis presentation.

Making a decision on the best font for thesis presentation might be difficult because there are so many possibilities. The two most frequent major font classifications for academic purposes are sans serif and serif. Each group has advantages and disadvantages. The following are the top ten fonts for thesis presentations

Serif or Sans Serif? 

Serif and sans-serif fonts boast advantages and drawbacks. Serif fonts are lauded for their print readability, as the serifs guide the eye along the text lines. Sans-serif fonts, however, are favored for on-screen reading due to their lack of serifs reducing eye strain.

Finally, the choice between serif and sans-serif boils down to personal preference. It is important to select the font that you feel is most appealing and appropriate for the aim of the presentation.

Factors to consider before selecting a font?

The best font for thesis presentation depends on your tastes as well as the necessities. Assess the readability, style, and suitability of the target audience of the typeface. The typeface should enhance rather than distract from the message.

The list of fonts available for selection is extensive, ranging from more conservative options like Times New Roman to more modern and sleek-looking options like Helvetica or Futura. When selecting a font for thesis presentation, choosing a suitable option that portrays professionalism without sacrificing aesthetic appeal is crucial.

Legibility should be at the top of your list of considerations. Your thesis should be accessible to a wide range of audiences, so it is crucial to avoid fancy or overly stylized fonts that may be difficult to read.

Additionally, the font size and spacing should be carefully considered. Avoid using condensed or tight lettering that can make the text appear cluttered. Proper spacing between letters and lines enhances legibility and makes the content visually appealing.

The fonts listed below were selected based on their readability, professionalism, and appropriateness for academic presentations. The fonts are in no particular ranking order:

Garamond is an example of a serif typeface that is distinguished by its timeless nature. Its beauty and intelligibility offer it a traditional and professional style that will elevate your thesis presentation.

Example of Garamond font styling :

Palatino is another serif font commonly used for academic presentations that require a sophisticated look. Its elegant design makes it practical for detailed information and H1s alike.

Example of Palatino font styling :

Bodoni’s is an example of a high-contrast and elegant serif font. Its unique design makes it perfect for h1s, titles, and short text blocks.

Example of Bodoni font styling :

This serif font’s letterforms have a distinctive curved shape, giving it a soft and refined appearance. Bell MT’s versatility makes it great for academic presentations that require a professional look.

Example of Bell MT font styling

Verdana is a sans-serif font intended for screen use, making it suitable for digital presentations. Verdana’s excellent readability and simple design are ideal when showcasing complex information.

Example of Verdana font styling :

Segoe is a sans-serif font often seen in Microsoft products. It has a simple design that is ideal for making your presentations look sleek and more modern.

Example of Segoe font styling:

Franklin Gothic

Franklin Gothic is a sans-serif font with a bold and commanding presence suitable for titles and h1s. Its bold design guarantees that your thesis will stand out and draw the attention of your panel. This is a preferred font for thesis presentation.

Example of Franklin Gothic font styling:

Candara sans-serif font was designed for use in Windows Vista . Its sleek and modern look is perfect for contemporary work. It has top-notch readability and is the ideal font if you are looking to achieve a minimalist look.

Example of Candara font styling :

Tahoma is an example of a sans-serif font with narrow letters with a brief appearance. Tahoma’s distinctive feature is its ease of reading due to its narrow design and sufficient spacing between letters. Tahoma’s versatility makes it popular for academic presentations, as it offers a modern appearance while maintaining high legibility. Additionally, its unique design allows Tahoma’s to be mixed with other formats to show similarities and contrast.

Example of Tahoma font styling :

Corbel’s wide letterforms and generous letter spacing make it an excellent sans-serif font for academic presentations, as it offers high readability. Its wide design also makes it suitable for H1s and titles and is suitable if you intend to impact the panel.

Example of Corbel font styling:

With so many options, it is important to select a style that looks professional and complements you as a writer. Remember that your audience/panel will likely have received multiple thesis presentations, all with unique styles and structures. The right font style will help you communicate your ideas and defend your thesis effectively while being memorable. And just as important as your thesis font styling is your font size.

What size font for thesis presentation?

The ideal font size should strike a balance between readability and visual impact. Generally, sizes 28 and 32 are the sweet spots for body texts, while heading 1 and titles can be larger.

However, the size of the display device and distance to the panel/audience are significant factors to consider. Large screens and displays often require large fonts to ensure legibility. A smaller font might be more suitable if you present your thesis on a small screen.

Also, consider the different x-heights for fonts which can affect the apparent text size. It is essential to test the font size on different screens and environments. You should aim for a font size that maximizes legibility and impact.

Professional Assistance with Your Thesis Presentation

Personal preferences, research type, and target audience determine the best font for thesis presentation. Select a font that communicates professionalism, readability, and elegance while showcasing the presentation’s unique style and personality.

If you require professional assistance with your thesis writing or PowerPoint presentation, do not hesitate to reach out for assistance. Our team of experts can assist you in creating a visually appealing and impactful presentation that will leave a lasting impression on your audience.

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• Presentations

What Are the Best Fonts to Use in PowerPoint PPT Presentations? (Complete 2024 Guide)

If you're giving a PowerPoint presentation, you've got many design decisions to make. One of those decisions is choosing the best fonts for PowerPoint presentations . Typography sets the tone for your presentation and is instrumental in presenting your content.

If you're wondering, " what is the best font for PowerPoint presentations ?" we'll answer that question in this tutorial. We'll survey the best font for PowerPoint designs but leave plenty of room for creative choice.

We'll discuss the best font size and type for PowerPoint presentations. Learn how you can use them to your advantage. You might be surprised how many PowerPoint font options exist. 

Choose the Right Fonts for PowerPoint (Quickstart Guide)

Are you looking for the best PowerPoint fonts, but aren't quite sure how to make the choice? The video below will help you make the choice.

To learn even more about fonts for PowerPoint and other presentations, continue reading the tutorial below.

Jump to content in this section:

The Essentials of Font Selection

The 10 best fonts to use for powerpoint ppt presentations in 2024, how to quickly customize fonts in a premium powerpoint template, templates featuring the best fonts for powerpoint presentations, common powerpoint questions answered (faq), learn more about powerpoint, design a great powerpoint with top typography today.

Fonts for PowerPoint can take many forms. And with thousands of PowerPoint font options, it can be really hard to decide.

What style is right? How should you steer your PPT best font decisions? In this section, I’ll share some quick tips to help you choose the best PowerPoint font for you.

1. Understand the Types of Fonts

When you're choosing the best font for PowerPoint slides, it's key to learn some ground rules of style. And it helps to understand the basic types of fonts that you can choose from. In this section, we'll discuss popular font styles:

First, let's cover serif fonts. Serif fonts, PowerPoint presentation or not, have a more classic feel to them. Serif fonts have brush strokes on the edges of the letters, sometimes called "feet."  These edge strokes are called the serifs. The popular system-installed serif fonts include Garamond, Georgia, and Times New Roman. They can definitely serve as some of the best fonts for presentations.

In 2024, the best font for PowerPoint presentations are sans-serif fonts. These are the modern and smooth typefaces that you'll find in most presentations. Sans means "without," so it's only natural that these fonts lack the edge strokes. The result is smooth, rounded fonts that are popular in modern design.

These two simple categories are useful to describe most fonts. But other choices might be the best font for your PowerPoint presentation. Script and decorative fonts are other unique options. 

They may be right for special purpose presentations.

What is the best font for PowerPoint presentations? The answer is, "it depends." As always, let the content drive your design decisions. But as a general rule, sticking to serif and sans-serif designs helps you stay stylish. And you won't lose the focus of your audience by having text that's too hard to read. 

Formal presentations in ideal environments should opt for serif options. But most presentations should typically use sans-serif fonts. Those decorative PowerPoint options should be used sparingly at most.

2. Choose Font Sizes for Your PowerPoint Presentation

For the best use of PowerPoint fonts, it's crucial to consider your choice of font size. Many PowerPoint users will ask, " what is a good font size for PowerPoint presentations? " In reality, you should vary your font size based on the content that you're presenting. Headlines should always be larger than the supporting points, for example.

My rule of thumb for PowerPoint fonts is to use a size 32 or larger for headlines, with 24 or larger for supporting points. Go much smaller than that, and you're entering "only readable for print outs" territory. 

Font size goes hand-in-hand with the principle of "less is more" on your PowerPoint slides. When you don't have to cram tons of content onto your slide, you can use larger font sizes.

3. Use Font Pairings

Many graphic designers use more than one font when building PowerPoint presentations. Using more than a few fonts is over the top but combining two complementary font choices is a pro design move.

This practice is an art called  font pairing.  The best font for PowerPoint might actually be a  combination  of fonts.

One idea for a font pairing is to use a sophisticated serif font for headlines and titles. Then, use sans-serif fonts for the majority of the body points. This gives you the PPT best font for both kinds of text.

If you use a free font resource like Google Fonts , you'll see pairing suggestions that help you combine fonts that work together well. The key to font pairing is to use the alternate font choices consistently. For example, always reserve headlines for one font in your selection.

4. Select Color and Contrast in Your Font for PowerPoint

Beyond size, style, and pairings, one element of font choice that you can't avoid is color and contrast. You can choose the perfect font and format it correctly, but clashing color schemes disrupt slides.

Keep three essential tips in mind when considering font color and contrast:

• Create contrast . Contrast is important so that your text stands out on the slide and is easy to read. Don't use a dark grey font on a black background, for example. Ensuring proper contrast will make the important content stand out.
• Consider accessibility . Colorblindness is surprisingly common. It's likely that a member of your audience has some form of it and will experience your slides differently. Make sure to choose color schemes that don't interfere with their experience.
• Use colors that fit the scheme . Make sure that you consistently use font colors that are part of your branding guide. Use the color swatches to ensure no variation from one slide to the next.

It’s key to use the best font for presentations to ensure your slides are accessible to everyone. Learn more below:

5. Use Creative Text Effects

So far, we've covered font choice, including style, size, and pairings. We’ve already looked at how to put the best font for PowerPoint onto your slides. But now, you might be wondering about how to be more creative with your style and design.

PowerPoint has plenty of effects to ensure that your text doesn't go unnoticed. You can add animations, shadows, and more. These text effects make your PowerPoint font choices more lively and fun.

The tutorial below is a complete guide to working with text in PowerPoint. Check it out to learn more about adding text as well as advanced effects to make the most of your content:

6. Understand the Power of Custom Fonts

Sure, every device includes standard fonts to choose from. But they're not the best font for PowerPoint designs! When you want to really set your slides apart, consider using custom PowerPoint fonts. These are sleek designs that your audience may have never seen.

Above, I've shared screenshots with custom fonts from Envato Elements. With an Elements subscription , you'll enjoy thousands of custom PowerPoint fonts . You can use each of them in your next presentation. 

Elements includes access to fonts across every category that we highlighted above. They're some of the best font for PowerPoint options. Elements' library has PowerPoint font options that you won't find anywhere else! 

After you discover the best font for presentations, you'll need to add it to PowerPoint. To learn how to install PowerPoint fonts, check out the quick screencast lesson below:

Ready to see options for the best font for presentations?  Now that we’ve covered how to choose the right fonts for your presentation, here are the best fonts to use for your PPT presentations in 2024: 

Calibri is a modern sans-serif font that comes in several weights. It’s a perfect choice for the body text of your presentation.

2. Palatino Linotype

Here’s another stylish serif font that makes a great choice for headings or quote slides in your presentations. 

Roboto features geometric forms with friendly and open curves. It's a modern and clean look that makes it a good choice for your body text.

4. RNS Sanz

With seven weights ranging from Light to Black and small caps, the RNS Sanz is a great choice for any type of presentation. 

5. Playfair Display

Give any presentation a sophisticated and elegant look by using Playfair Display for the headings or quote slides.

6. CA Texteron

The CA Texteron font is a modern serif font with high legibility. Use it for both headings and body text for your presentation. 

Lato has an elegant yet friendly look and feel. It’s a great choice for your body text and a true workhorse as it features multiple weights ranging from thin to black. 

The Arthura font is a premium sans-serif font with a humanist warmth and simple geometric forms. It's one of the best PowerPoint fonts for body copy.

Once you've selected your font for presentation designs, it's time to get to work.  But the best font for PowerPoint slides is just part of the process. Here, we'll show you five key steps to PPT change all fonts options.

We'll demonstrate with the premium Brusher PowerPoint Template from Envato Elements. It's compatible with all of the fonts for PowerPoint techniques you'll see. Download it now to follow along.

1. Choose Your Slides

The first step is to select the slides you’re going to use in your presentation. To do this, switch to Slide Sorter under the View tab.

Then hold Shift and click the slides you don’t want to use. Finally, right-click and select Delete Slide to remove them from the presentation.

2. Add Your Text

To add your content to the presentation, double-click on a text area. Press CTRL+A to select all the text and then start typing in your own content.

3. Change the Body Font

After you've added your content, it’s time to customize the fonts. Start by selecting your body text. Then, in the Home tab, click on the font drop-down menu and select the font you want to use. In this example, I’m using the Calibri font for the body text.

4. Change the Heading Font

To add more flair to your presentation, customize the heading font as well. You can opt for a completely different font or simply use a different weight from the font you used for body text. In this example, I’ve opted to use Palatino Linotype for my headings.

5. Adjust the Font Styles

Lastly, don’t forget to customize the font styles. For example, both Calibri and Palatino Linotype offer different font weights. I’ve chosen to use Calibri Regular for body font and Palatino Linotype Bold for headings.

Aside from weight, you can also customize the font size and even assign a different color to your headings to make them stand out more.

Need help choosing the best PowerPoint fonts? My top recommendation is to use a template that already has the fonts selected. If you can cut the hard work of choosing the best PowerPoint font, you can re-focus on presentation content.

Once again, Envato Elements is your answer. As a member, you'll enjoy unlimited access to thousands of custom PowerPoint templates . Many have the best PowerPoint font designs already built in. And of course, Elements has thousands of custom fonts , too!

Find PowerPoint Templates

When you use custom PowerPoint templates, you outsource the design work. The challenge of choosing the best font for PowerPoint presentations is left to creative designers. They've already built slides that feature good font choices for presentations. Just fill them in with your content, and you'll be finished in no time.

In this section, you'll see templates with the best font for PowerPoint presentations. All are included with a subscription to Elements, the creative service you saw above.

1. Agio PowerPoint Presentation

Agio uses smooth sans-serif font choices throughout. These are among the best fonts for PowerPoint options, since they're extra crisp and clear. 

Nine color schemes are used, each of which is already set up with color-coordinated text. It's an example of using fonts that highlight the content, while staying stylish. Keep Agio in mind as a template with good fonts for presentations PowerPoint.

2. Fashioned Stylist PowerPoint

The Fashioned presentation template also uses popular sans-serif choices. But it also uses variations on typography for an impact.

Notice that many of these slides in the preview use all-caps strings of text to add emphasis to slides. It's a great example of using text effects to enhance slides with bold design.

3. Brutto Real Estate PowerPoint Template

With a major focus on serif fonts, it's no wonder why this template is an ideal fit for the traditional world of real estate. Serif fonts have a classic feel to them, and this template illustrates that perfectly.

This template also features many infographic and business-centric slides. They're perfect for showcasing your business concept. 

4. Brusher PowerPoint Template

Brusher's 120 slides use popular PPT font options that are included for free. It also has modern, custom image masks that can enhance your images. The starkly contrasting black and white color scheme is an excellent example of font contrast. Use Brusher to build a presentation with balanced typography in no time.

We’ve looked at some of the best font for presentation designs for 2024. But you may have some other questions. What else can you do with the best font for presentations? How can PowerPoint work better for you? Here, we’ve gathered answers to five of these common questions.

1. Can I Wrap Text in PowerPoint?

Yes! The best fonts for presentations can be featured as wrapped text. Or you can even curve the text! This adds a cool, dramatic effect very easily. Learn how to do it here:

2. How Do I Animate the Best PowerPoint Fonts?

The Animations tab in PowerPoint is really your best friend here. On it, you can add sleek animation effects.

What’s more: these work with all of your PPT best font favorites . You can even PPT change all fonts to be animated in order to maintain a steady look and feel across your slide deck.

Turn to our full guide for more details:

3. Is a PowerPoint Font Able to Be a Word Cloud Design?

Absolutely. A font for presentation use is perfect for building a PPT word cloud. Word clouds are visuals with words shown in an array of colors, layouts, and sizes.

You can even leverage the best font for presentations in word clouds. These are sure to make an impact. They help you illustrate ideas, and they’re easy to make with your best PowerPoint font choice. Learn more:

4. How Do I Highlight the Best Font for Presentations?

Sometimes, even the best font for PowerPoint needs some help standing out. That’s where highlighting comes in. When you highlight your PPT best font, you’ll see it shaded in a new color of your choice.

The Text Highlight Color button on the home tab controls this. Learn more about it in our highlighting tutorial for PowerPoint:

5. Can I Add Superscripts to Fonts for PowerPoint?

Yes, easily! Superscripts are small numbers that sit above the rest of your text. They’re most commonly used for citations in PowerPoint. Again, they’re quick to add using your favorite font for presentation options. 

Learn how to do it in just sixty seconds here:

Choosing the best font for a PowerPoint presentation is just one part of designing your next slide deck. PowerPoint has so many features that it can be overwhelming to know where to start. But don't worry—PowerPoint can be mastered just like any other app.

If you're still learning PowerPoint, we've got you covered with many helpful resources. The single best starting point is How to Use PowerPoint (Ultimate Tutorial Guide.) This single resource is loaded with tutorials that you can use to improve every aspect of your presentation.

The best fonts for presentations are more powerful with the help of learning resources. For more templates and guides that include PowerPoint design tips, check out the tutorials below:

Typography is a huge part of setting the style of your presentation. The tips in this round-up are helpful to choose custom fonts that fit with your presentation's style. 

Remember to choose a font style (serif or sans-serif) that matches your presentation's tone. Also, use font sizes and weights to bring emphasis to the most essential parts of your presentation.

Turn to Envato Elements for the best PowerPoint font designs available today. With thousands to choose from , it’s easy to find a winning PPT best font for you. And remember to pair it with a stunning best PowerPoint font template , with slide layouts hand-crafted for you.

Get started on your next presentation today. Choose and download your favorite template.

Editorial Note: This post was originally published in June of 2019. It's been revised to make it current, accurate, and up to date by our staff—with special help from Brenda Barron and Andrew Childress . A video has been added by Andrew Childress.

The Best 24 Fonts for Modern PowerPoint Presentations [+Guide]

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By Lyudmil Enchev

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2 years ago

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Presentations are pieces of art. From slide structure to animations, every single detail matters. In this blog post, we will show you the 24 best PowerPoint fonts for all uses. Of course, like everything in design – you might like some and frown at others.

What we can guarantee you is that using this collection of top fonts for PowerPoint will always be a safe bet when you’re in doubt.

Article Overview: 1. How to import a font into your presentation? 2. Great Fonts to Use for your PowerPoint Presentations 3. Great System fonts for PowerPoint Presentations 4. How to design text in PowerPoint?

1. How to import a font into your presentation?

If you don’t know how to import fonts into PowerPoint, it’s important to learn how to do it.

Step 1. Download your fonts

The first step is to select your desired font and download it.

Step 2. Extract the font

Once you’ve downloaded the font, it’s most probably compressed. You need to extract it before installation. If it comes directly as a .otf or .ttf format, there’s no need to unzip.

Step 3. Install the font

Install the font. The process is similar to installing any software, just press “Next” until you see the option “Finish”. If your fonts have been successfully installed, they should appear in the Font library in Windows. To access it, go to your computer, Local Disk (C:)->Windows-> Fonts .

Step 4. Open PowerPoint

Once you open your PowerPoint, the new font should appear among the others.

2. Great Fonts to Use for your PowerPoint Presentations

Fonts are a great way to show some branding skills but also a significant part of your presentation. Of course, we cannot select the best PowerPoint fonts or the best fonts in general, it’s a too subjective matter. But we will try to show you some of the most versatile ones that you will not make a mistake with. Let’s start!

Lato is a very common font that is used in digital forms since it was created for this purpose. It is a sans-serif font that is flexible. One of the most useful things about it is that you can choose between 5 different options for font thickness, giving it extra value when creating PowerPoint presentations.

Recommended title size:  20px

Optimum size for legibility:  18px

Perfect for:  headers and body text

You can combine it with: Roboto, Montserrat, Merriweather

2. Open Sans

Open Sans is another great font that can fit PowerPoint presentations perfectly. Since there is some line spacing, it can be easily readable. If you have large paragraphs that you cannot break down in bullets, it’s your perfect choice. It’s a standard PowerPoint font, so you’ll most probably have it in your font library.

Recommended title size: 28px

Optimum size for legibility:  16px

Perfect for:  body text

You can combine it with: Georgia, Lucida Grande, Publico

Candara is not your everyday font. While you cannot use it in Linux or the web, as it’s proprietary,  it’s accessible in PowerPoint, and what makes it interesting are the curved diagonals, and it’s the curves that give it more “personality”.

Recommended title size: 20px

Optimum size for legibility: 16px

Perfect for: body text

You can combine it with: Calibri, Cambria, Corbel

Specifically designed for Windows 95, Tahoma is a very formal font that can fit business presentations perfectly. It is a very clear and distinctive font which can help avoid confusion, thus it makes it great for formal presentations that need clarity.

Optimum size for legibility: 18px

Perfect for: title headers and body text

You can combine it with:  Georgia, Helvetica Neue, Arial

5. Montserrat

Montserrat is an extremely popular font, as it can be utilized everywhere – from website texts to presentations. Due to its high practicality, you can find it almost anywhere. Well, we need to warn you that you won’t get many “originality” points but you’ll also be “safe” when using it.

Recommended title size: 30px

You can combine it with: Open Sans, Lora, Carla

Whitney is an amazing font that will make your presentation stand out. There are two options – Whitney Condensed and Whitney Narrow. To be honest, Whitney can be used for both headers and body texts (check Discord), but we find it a bit overwhelming for PowerPoint paragraphs.

Recommended title size: 22px

Optimum size for legibility: 15px

Perfect for: title headers

You can combine it with:  Sentinel, Mercury, Gotham

7. Proxima Nova

Proxima Nova is one of the most versatile fonts out there with not 2 but 7 variants! That makes it a viable choice for many purposes and it’s part of the Adobe Fonts collection. The popularity spike is not without a reason, and Proxima Nova certainly won’t disappoint as it is one of the better fonts for PowerPoint.

Recommended title size: 26px

Perfect for: headers and body text

You can combine it with:  Adobe Garamond, Futura, Helvetica Neue

Oswald is a very decent sans-serif typeface and has 3 different versions – light, normal, and bold. It’s an interesting combination of some modern elements combined with classic gothic style, thus it’s perfect for your presentations.

Recommended title size: 18px

You can combine it with: Merriweather, Arial, Roboto

Europa is an amazing font from the Adobe Font Family. It’s a modern geometric sans-serif font that goes well with other fonts from the Adobe family but it can be used in a combination with non-Adobe fonts. It’s up to you.

Recommended title size: 32px

Optimum size for legibility: 20px

Perfect for: headers

You can combine it with:  Adobe Garamond, Chaparral, Kepler

Roboto is one of the most versatile fonts for the web, as it comes with 6 variations. Described as a grotesque sans-serif, it is the default font of Google Maps. Being easy to read makes it great for body texts where scanning is pivotal. While it’s great for small texts, it doesn’t perform that well for titles.

Recommended title size: 38px

Optimum size for legibility: 22px

You can combine it with: Roboto-Slab, Oswald, Abel

Adelle is a slab serif font that is part of the Adobe Family. It’s multipurpose and could work be well utilized and magazines. Its personality and great visibility make it a viable choice on our PowerPoint fonts list. While it can be used for body text too, we prefer to recommend it for headers.

Recommended title size: 36px

You can combine it with: Freight Sans Pro, Proxima Nova, Lucida Grande

14. Lobster

Lobster is a great choice if you want to create some funky text. It’s a great font for posters and headers but ensure you don’t use it much for body text, as it has very poor legibility if written in small letters.

Recommended title size: 58px

Optimum size for legibility: not recommended

You can combine it with: Lato, Open Sans, Muli

Futura is almost a century old but still converts well today! It’s one of the most versatile fonts for PowerPoint in case you download it. Who would suppose a 95-year-old font would still be relevant these days? And you will win points for creativity.

Optimum size for legibility: 17px

You can combine it with: Proxima Nova, New Caledonia, Trade Gothic

Canela is a hybrid font, as it can neither be called serif, nor sans-serif. It’s a very graceful typeface and we find it amazing for title texts. We also loved how it performs in the body from an artistic standpoint. However, we cannot rate it as very suitable for long paragraphs. Still, it can be used in bullets quite well.

You can combine it with: Caslon, Futura, Maison Neue

Aleo is an modern slab serif typeface designed as a “companion” to other popular fonts, like Lato. It has a sleek design but that doesn’t sacrifice readability which matters the most. As it has great clarity, it can be used both as a title text and in the body.

Recommended title size: 25px

Optimum size for legibility: 19px

You can combine it with: Lato, Arimo, Halis Grotesque

18. Poppins

Poppins is a playful sans-serif font that can be used as a main PowerPoint font without any issue. Thanks to its versatility, this PowerPoint font can be used both for title headers and body text, although we prefer the latter.

Recommended title size: 24px

Perfect for: header, body text

You can combine it with: Raleway, Work Sans, New Caledonia

Eras font has 4 weight options in PowerPoint and is absolutely stunning. It won’t be a mistake if we use it as a synonym to “elegance”. It’s slightly italic, thus making it perfect for long paragraphs and web content.

You can combine it with: Garamond, Futura, Helvetica Neue

Lora is a great font that is offered for free by Google. It is a formal font that doesn’t turn its back on art, and as a result, it can be utilized greatly in PowerPoint both as a header and in the body, and it can work perfectly in print, too.

You can combine it with: Lato, Avenir, Montserrat

3. Great System fonts for PowerPoint Presentations

System fonts are a classic choice for PowerPoint presentations as they are a pretty safe bet – you can access them on all types of devices and operating systems. While some of them might not be as beautiful as the previous ones on our list, they will serve you well!

21. Georgia

Georgia is a classic serif font that doesn’t impress with outstanding looks but what makes it a viable choice for PowerPoint presentations is its versatility – you can use it on any type of presentation, as a header or in the body. It’s popular, so you won’t make a mistake using it.

You can combine it with:

22. Times New Roman

Times New Roman was “The Thing” back in time. It was used as a default font for many web browsers and software, thus it was overwhelming. Recently, this serif font has lost its “halo” and is less common but you will never get it wrong if you bring it back to life.

Optimum size for legibility: 12px

You can combine it with: Arial, Gotham, Helvetica Neue

Arial is another well-known name in the web font industry. You can also check this neo-grotesque sans-serif font used in PowerPoint presentations quite often, as it offers a lot of versatility.

You can combine it with: Oswald, Verdana, Georgia

24. Helvetica Neue

Helvetica Neue is the successor of Helvetica which improved legibility and made it more modern. It is one of the most formal fonts that you can use in PowerPoint (and at all). This sans-serif font has 23 different variations in PowerPoint 2022 that you can choose from.

You can combine it with:  Open Sans, Proxima Nova, Adelle

4. How to design text in PowerPoint?

There are certain standards that should be met, in order for your PowerPoint fonts to appear correctly. Let’s see how to order your texts.

1. Make sure the font size is readable

Do you wonder why some websites have HUGE fonts? It’s to ensure their content will be easily scannable. While you don’t have to use a 60px font size for your letters, you should consider making your text more readable.

Pro tip : A simple and straightforward way to achieve this is to try and remove large paragraphs, and replace them with single sentences and bullet points.

2. Make a contrast between the text and background

There is an adopted standard of a minimum 4.5:1 contrast ratio between text and background for content to be scannable, and 3:1 for large text. There are people who have bad eyesight, and others are color blind.

3. Use white space

White space (or negative space) is crucial for your slide design. It is used to separate different parts of the text, making content more readable. It’s crucial to remember that you should leave some “air” after finishing a main point in the slide.

4. Find the right text balance

One of the best PowerPoint presentation practices is to write between 6-8 lines and use no more than 30-35 words. Also, you should try to balance the text evenly – you cannot write 4 lines, then follow them with 3 lines, and then 1. Typically, writing 2-3 lines per paragraph is considered a good move, then followed by white space.

Final words

Structuring your PowerPoint text is not an easy feat. You need to pick the right PowerPoint fonts, as well as follow some basic instructions to make your slide text more scannable for your audience.

If this article has helped you, why don’t you have a look at some other font-related content from GraphicMama:

• 40 Trendy Free Fonts for Commercial Use Today
• Top 20 Free Fonts: Trendy & Evergreen
• 44 of The Best Free Handwriting Fonts to Try in 2022

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How to choose the best font for a scientific presentation?

• April 11, 2022
• CAREER SKILLS

Are you the type of person who spends more time designing your presentation theme than creating the slides for the presentation the next day? Are you the type of person who wakes up in the middle of the night searching the internet for the best font for a scientific presentation?

Good! It means that you are passionate about being a better “communicator”. It does matter more than you think, especially in academia.

Presenting your work is as crucial as, if not more important than conducting research. Unfortunately, scientists have a reputation for being poor presenters. There is no purpose in doing research in the first place if one cannot communicate their knowledge. So, as future scientists, we should make a point to be good communicators.

A good presentation is a lot more than just “reporting” your research work. The mere goal of a presentation is to influence your listeners .

There should be some constraints in a professional setting to avoid unnecessary distractions. And you have to be careful to keep the presentation content simple and to the point. So, How to make a presentation that has all these elements?

The design choices we make in our presentations – the colours, the icons, the photography and illustrations – all form a kind of shorthand through which our audiences recognize the importance of the work we are doing and get a feel for the message we’re aiming to communicate.

The same rules apply to the fonts we use. Fonts have as significant an impact on design style as the visuals. Beautiful photography and well-designed icons can all be undermined by a poorly-chosen typeface. You should select a typeface that complements the rest of your design style and the essence you want to express. To put it another way, you’ll need a typeface with the appropriate’ voice.’

For instance, understanding enough about typefaces was one of Steve Jobs’ greatest advantages in becoming our generation’s Gutenberg. As he mentioned in one of his famous speeches,

Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and sans-serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, and what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating. How Steve Jobs became the Gutenberg of our times | TypeRoom

“The same way Gutenberg’s printing press gave rise to literacy in the late Renaissance era, Steve Jobs’ digital typefaces gave rise to design as something that is as important as the idea of creating. Everything” Loukas Karnis

The information below will help you choose the best font for your next scientific presentation.

Are you using Windows-standard font?

Custom fonts will be discussed later in this article, but one of the essential points to consider is whether the typeface you want to use is Windows-standard. If you create a stunning presentation using a custom font and then transfer it to a colleague who doesn’t have the font installed, the presentation will be a mess of mis-sized default fonts that isn’t fit for purpose.

So, if you intend to use your presentation on many machines, you’ll need a Windows-standard font that will work on all of them.

This is critical for a variety of reasons. For example, imagine you’re preparing a presentation for a conference.

There is a bigger chance that you might not be presenting on your laptop. Suppose you used a different font that does not come by default in presentation apps like Microsoft PowerPoint or Apple keynote.

In that case, the program will pick another similar font available. In a situation like this, the problem is that your presentation design might be slightly off if your font is different, leading to some serious problems.

I found myself in a similar situation at a conference; for example, some of my slides’ equations were completely off, and some were not even visible. Having to present in front of an audience on top of that additional pressure is not an empowering feeling.

There are two solutions for avoiding such situations:

(1) You can use a default font that comes with the presentation app you will use. There are so many elegant fonts there that come with the presentation apps.

(2) Or, if you want to stick with a specific font that does not come with the presentation app you are using, and if you cannot use your own laptop, you can quickly install the font on the laptop or PC you are using. If you do this at a conference, make sure to take care of it before the conference begins. Even if your presentation is after the coffee break, do not wait until the coffee break to install the font.

Serif or sans serif?

Serif fonts feature small ticks or ‘wings’ at the ends of their lines. They are typically associated with serious, business-like, intellectual content . In contrast, sans serif fonts have no marks on the ends of their lines and are usually regarded as modern, sleek, and clean.

Serif typefaces are superior for print and body text, according to conventional knowledge , since the serifs lead the eye from one character to the next like connected handwriting.

On the other hand, Sans serif fonts are ideal for titles and text displayed on a screen. These aren’t, however, hard and fast norms!

One popular option is to use one of each; for example, titles could be sans serif, and body text could be serif, but the choice is yours – go with what feels best for your presentation.

Factors that affect the readability

It might be good to go for ones that “aren’t built” to be tightly spaced. It provides breathing room within text and headings. It has a lighter appearance and is easier to read when adequately spaced.

Write content in sentence case. Title case can be used in proper titles, product names and service names. Avoid the use of all uppercase or “all caps” in your typography, especially for paragraphs or text.

Write content in sentence case. Proper titles, product names, and service names can all use title cases. In your typography, avoid using all uppercase or “all capitals,” especially for paragraphs or body content.

Belt and suspenders

In typography, the term “belt and suspenders” refers to the use of various styles to reach the same goal. Your presentation font should always be essential when emphasizing words, so keep styles to a minimum.

Avoid using more than two font sizes because it may confuse your audience and make your presentation seem complex. Make sure your font size is at least 18 points.

Best fonts for a scientific presentation

Having so many alternatives to choose from might be intimidating at times. However, in that case, you must ensure that the typefaces you choose have all of the necessary characteristics. As a result, limit yourself to a few fonts. Here are a few such fonts that can be used in any professional presentation.

The typeface Helvetica has been called “the little black dress” of typefaces. Helvetica is a versatile font that may be used in any professional presentation. It has been considered one of the best fonts for a scientific presentation

Read more about Helvetica :

The typeface that landed on the moon. This font is designed with three simple shapes. Circles, triangles and squares. It is one of the most readable typefaces due to its simplicity and is regarded as one of the best fonts for a scientific presentation.

Read more about Futura :

The theme of the font, Avenir is “A time for a font with a human touch”. It has a unique touch as the theme suggests that anybody would be comfortable reading content written in this font. Therefore, this font is especially well-suited to lengthy presentations.

Read more about Avenir :

Final words

It’s never easy to pick the best font for a scientific presentation. However, spending some time picking the correct font for your next presentation would not be a waste of time. Here are the key points for choosing the best font for your next scientific presentation.

• Use one, or a maximum of two, typefaces in your presentation
• Choose suitable font sizes (for titles, body copy) and use them consistently
• Be consistent with the use of bold, italics, or underline typefaces.
• Check if the conference or event has specific guidelines for formatting presentations and make sure to follow them

Images courtesy : Alphabet letters vector created by freepik – www.freepik.com , Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

Aruna Kumarasiri

Founder at Proactive Grad, Materials Engineer, Researcher, and turned author. In 2019, he started his professional carrier as a materials engineer with the continuation of his research studies. His exposure to both academic and industrial worlds has provided many opportunities for him to give back to young professionals.

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Choosing the Best Font for PowerPoint: 10 Tips & Examples

There’s a fine art to creating a great PowerPont presentation that wows. With so many tricks and features in this little bit of software, it’s more likely to see a bad presentation than a good one (and you don’t want to be that person!)

While there are a lot of factors that contribute to the overall design , choosing a suitable font for PowerPoint is near the top of the list. The audience needs to be able to read the words on the screen with ease, to ensure that your presentation is as effective as possible.

So how do you do it? Where do you start when choosing a font for PowerPoint? We have 10 tips for you with a few examples of PowerPoint slides (and templates) that will impress your audience.

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1. Stick to Fairly Standard Fonts

One of the most fun parts of a design project is getting to sift through fonts and make selections that fit your project. When it comes to PowerPoint, that selection should be pretty limited.

To make the most of your presentation, stick to a standard font to ensure that your presentation will look the same everywhere – and on every computer – you present. If you don’t use a standard font, chances are when you pop the presentation in a new machine, you’ll end up with a jumbled mess of lettering. PowerPoint will try to replace all the fonts it does not recognize with something else.

This can cause readability concerns and even make the presentation look like it’s error-filled (with words that are in odd locations or even missing).

10 standard fonts to try:

2. Incorporate Plenty of Contrast

White and black text is easiest to read. But no type is readable without plenty of contrast between the background and text itself.

Regardless of what font you select, without adequate contrast, readability will be a concern. Opt for light type on a dark background or a light background with dark text.

Consider the environment here as well. Do you plan to show the presentation on a computer monitor or big presentation screen? How these conditions render can impact how much contrast your color choices actually have.

3. Use a Serif and a Sans Serif

Most presentations use two fonts.

• Header font for headlines on each slide.
• Copy or bullet font for supporting text.

You don’t have to use the same font in each location. It’s actually preferred to select two different fonts for these areas of the presentation. For even more impact pair two different fonts, such as a serif and sans serif, so that the font change creates an extra level of contrast and visual interest.

4. Avoid All Caps

When picking a font, stay away from fonts that only include capital letter sets. All caps in presentations have the same effect as all caps in an email. It feels like you are yelling at the audience.

All caps can also be difficult to read if there are more than a couple of words on the screen. Use all caps as sparingly as possible.

5. Stay Away From Scripts and Italics

While scripts, handwriting and novelty typefaces might be pretty, they are often difficult to read. Avoid them in PowerPoint presentations. (There’s usually not enough contrast or size to help them maintain readability from a distance.)

The same is true of italics. Anything you do to a font to add emphasis should make it easier to read. While italics can be a great option online or in print applications, presentations come with a different set of rules. The biggest contributing factor is that text often has to be read from a distance – think about audience members in the back of the room – and any slanting can make that more difficult.

6. Make It Big Enough

One of the biggest issues with fonts in slideshows is often size. How big should the text in a PowerPoint presentation be?

While a lot of that depends on the font you decide to use, there are some guidelines. (These sizes work wonderfully with the 10 fonts options in top No. 1. As well.)

• Minimum font size for main copy and bullets: 18 points
• Preferred font size for main copy and bullets: 24 points
• Preferred font size for headers or titles: 36 to 44 points

Make sure to think about the size of the screen and room as well when planning font sizes. With a smaller screen in a larger space, everything will look smaller than it is. The opposite is true of an oversized screen in a small room. Think Outside the Slide has a great font cheat sheets for a number of different screen sizes.

7. Turn Off Animations

Don’t let all those PowerPoint tricks suck you in. Moving text, zooming words, letters that fly in from the side of the screen – they are all difficult to read. And really distracting.

If you want to use an effect, “Appear” is acceptable. But there’s no need to dazzle the audience with crazy font tricks. All this really does is distract people from what you are really trying to say.

The same mantra that we use with all other design projects applies here as well – KISS or Keep It Simple, Stupid.

8. Plan for Sharing

While many users work with PowerPoint regularly, chances are that you’ll be asked to share your presentation slides for others. This includes posting with tools such as SlideShare, emailing the PowerPoint (or putting it in a drop folder) or sharing via Google Slides.

When it comes to fonts, Google Slides is the most complicating factor because it has a different suite of standard fonts than PC or Mac operating systems. Make sure to test the presentation in this environment if you plan to share and use a Google standard font or make sure to include the font you plan to use in the customization options.

9. Think About the Notes, Too

The part of PowerPoint presentations that is often neglected is the notes section. If you plan to distribute a presentation file to the audience (digitally or via printouts), the font selection for accompanying notes is important.

Use the same typeface as for the main slideshow with related corresponding headers and body and bulleted text. The big difference here is size. Body copy/bulleted information should fall in the range of 9 to 12 points and headers should be 18 to 20 points. This is a comfortable reading size for most documents. (These sizes also help ensure clear printing on standard office machines.)

10. Use Fonts Consistently

You don’t need a huge font library to create great PowerPoint presentations. Having a couple of go-to fonts that you use consistently is enough.

Make sure to use fonts consistently within a document as well. Create a PowerPoint template file so that when you use different levels of bulleting and headers, the sizes, color variations, and fonts change automatically. (Web designers, this is just like using H1 through H6 tags.)

A clear consistent use of fonts makes your presentation about how it looks and how easy (or tough) it may be to read and more about the content therein. (And that’s what it should be about.)

If you don’t feel comfortable making your own PowerPoint presentation template, you can download one to get started. These options might have a more refined look than some of the software defaults (and all of the examples in this article come from these collections).

• 25+ Minimal PowerPoint Templates
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Best Fonts for Presentations (Powerpoint or Otherwise)

Any marketer will tell you the importance of branding in design. Branding extends from color choices to fonts, and encompasses everything in between. To create familiarity and trust with prospective clients and customers, designs should be consistent across all website pages, marketing materials, and sales collateral. This means that your company’s homepage, emails, social media graphics, and even presentations should all reflect your brand in the same way. 

Beautiful.ai makes it easy to employ your branding and stay consistent from pitch to pitch. Simply create a custom theme complete with your company colors, fonts, and logos— then set it and forget it. Your theme will automatically be applied to your presentation deck so every slide is cohesive and on-brand. Gone are the days of having to manually tinker with fonts and colors for every new slide you add (who has time for that, anyway?). You can use our best presentation fonts, or upload your own, to match your brand standards.

Fonts are more important than you might think. For starters, it can be the difference between a legible presentation and one that your audience is having to squint to follow along with. But it’s more than that. Typefaces can evoke different emotions just like colors do . Is your font cheeky and fun, or serious and professional? The fonts you choose for your presentation can impact how it is received by your audience. 

Deciding which are the best presentation fonts for your company will vary depending on your industry, offerings, and overarching brand message. Your fonts in any client-facing deck should reflect one of two things; 1) your company’s branding, and/or 2) the story you’re trying to convey.

What are the best fonts for powerpoint— or Beautiful.ai— to encourage a successful outcome? 

Six good presentation fonts for your brand to explore

In this blog we share six good presentation fonts that can take your deck to the next level and wow your audience. 

Roboto is a versatile font with different purposes. The style is both geometric while featuring bubbly and open curves. It maintains each letter’s natural width, making it much easier to read and comprehend. A good option for bulleted points or text-heavy decks. 

Poppins typeface is geometric and clean, and includes over 15 different font weights. Ranging from thin to black, the font's openness is great for both presentation headlines and body copy. Poppins can be pretty understated or have a lot of personality depending on context and font weight.

Trocchi comes from a long line of old facetypes from the English typecutter Vincent Figgins. Its variation on the earlier designs offers a more casual slab serif. Trocchi is commonly used for both text and display type, which makes it a versatile font for headlines and body text in your presentation. 

Jost is a good free alternative to Futura, which is a classic. While inspired by the traditional sans serif, Jost is a trendy font for the digital era. It’s a good option for making your presentation appear more modern, without being too cheeky or casual. 

Montserrat is a geometric sans-serif typeface that was inspired by old posters and signs in the Montserrat neighborhood of Buenos Aires. Julieta Ulanovsky designed this font to restore the uniqueness of urban typography from the early twentieth century. It boasts more personality than helvetica and arial, but is still simplistic in its own right. 

Glodok is a single-weight display font. It is known for its bold, heavy style and can be fun to play around with in a presentation title or headline. Glodok is eye-catching, but not over the top so you can make a statement without compromising professional design. It’s a retro-inspired typeface that has a nice balance between structured and playful. 

Jordan Turner

Jordan is a Bay Area writer, social media manager, and content strategist.

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Great fonts for a PhD thesis – and terrible ones

There are thousands of fonts out there – which one should you choose for a great-looking PhD thesis? I will explain the differences between serif and sans-serif fonts, what ligatures are and why you shouldn’t use that fun free font you found on the internet.

Great fonts for a PhD thesis: Serif vs. sans-serif

As I explained in my Ultimate Guide to preparing a PhD thesis for printing , there are two basic kinds of fonts: Serif fonts and sans-serif fonts. Serif fonts have small lines – serifs – at the ends of all lines. Sans-serif fonts don’t have those lines. Compare these two, Palatino Linotype and Arial:

Serifs guide the reader’s eyes, making sure that they stay in the same line while reading a printed text. In turn, your reader’s brain won’t get tired so quickly and they can read for longer.

But there is another feature that many serif fonts have. Look at these three (which are all great fonts to use in your PhD thesis, btw):

If you look closely, you will see that serif fonts often have different stroke thicknesses within every letter. This is called “weight contrast”. A subtle weight contrast further improves legibility of a printed text. Hence, I recommend you use a serif font with a bit of a weight contrast for your main text.

Which serif font should you choose?

But whatever you do, this one thing is extremely important: Choose a font that offers all styles: regular, italics , bold , and bold italics . Since these four styles all need to be designed separately, many fonts don’t offer all of them. Especially bold italics is absent in most free internet fonts and even from many fonts that come with your operating system or word processor.

Also: In your bibliography and in-text citations (if you go with an author-year citation style) you will have to display author’s names from all over the world. Many of them will contain special letters. For example German umlauts (ä, ö, ü), accented letters used in lots of of languages, i.e. French or Spanish (à, é, ñ, etc.), and dozens of other special letters from all kinds of languages (ç, ı, ł, ø, etc.). Be aware that only a very limited number of fonts offer all of these!

If you have mathematical equations in your thesis that require more than +, – and =, your font choices are limited even further . After all, the vast majority of fonts do not offer special operators.

As you can see, these criteria severely limit your choice of font for the main text. Needless to say, they rule out free fonts you can download from dafont.com or 1001fonts.com . That is why I urge you to go with a classic font. To make things easier for you, here is a table with serif fonts that offer all the characters you could dream of:

Failsafe serif fonts for your PhD thesis

These fonts are heavily based on fonts that have been in use since the invention of the mechanical printing press in the 15th century. Hence, these types of fonts have been tried and tested for more than 500 years. Hard to argue with that!

But which of these fonts is The Best TM for a PhD thesis? That depends on how much text you have in your thesis vs. how many figures, tables, equations, etc. As I have noted in the table, fonts have different widths. Look at this image showing the same text in Times New Roman (TNR), Cambria, and Sitka Text; all at the same size:

Hence, setting entire pages of text in TNR will make the page look quite dense and dark. So, a thesis with a lot of text and few figures is best set in a wider font like Sitka Text. On the other hand, if you have a lot of figures, tables, etc., TNR is a good choice because it keeps paragraphs of text compact and therefore the page from looking too empty. Medium-width fonts like Cambria are a good compromise between the two.

To see some of these fonts in action, check out this example PhD thesis where I show all sorts of font combinations and page layouts.

When to use a sans-serif font in your PhD thesis

This covers serif fonts. But which sans-serif fonts are great for your PhD thesis? And when do you use them?

As mentioned above, serif fonts are good for the main text of your thesis. But titles and headings are a different story. There, a sans-serif font will look very nice. Plus, using a different font in your headings than in the main text will help the reader recognize when a new section begins.

Here are some examples for good sans-serif fonts:

Each of these fonts – Futura, Franklin Gothic Book, and Gill Sans – are wonderful for headings in a PhD thesis. Why? Because they are easily readable, well-balanced and don’t call undue attention to themselves. Also, they have many options: regular, light, medium, bold, extra bold, including italics for all of them. And most operating systems or word processors have them pre-installed.

The criteria for heading fonts are not nearly as strict as those for main text fonts. If you have Latin species names in your headings, make sure the font offers (bold) italics. If you need to display Greek letters in your headings, make sure the font offers those. Done.

However, there are some criteria for headings. Just for fun, let’s have a look at some sans-serif fonts that would be a bad choice for a thesis:

I’d like to explicitly state that these are wonderful, well-designed fonts – you just shouldn’t use them in a scientific document. Heattenschweiler is too narrow, Broadway has too much weight contrast and Aspergit Light is too thin. All of these things impair readability and might make your opponents squint at your headings. Of course, you will want to do everything in your power to make the experience of reading your thesis as pleasant a possible for your opponents!

How are these fonts great for my PhD thesis? They are boring!

Why yes, they are, thanks for noticing!

Seriously though, the fonts not being interesting is the point. Your PhD thesis is a scientific document showing your expertise in your field and your ability to do independent research. The content of your thesis, the science, should be the sole focus. A PhD thesis is not the place to show off your quirky personality by way of an illegible font.

However, you can infuse your personality into your thesis cover and chapter start pages. There, you can use a fun font, since you probably don’t have to display any special characters.

Choosing the right font is too much pressure? Contact me for help with your layout!

Don’t use fonts made for non-Latin alphabets (Cyrillic, Hanzi, etc.)

Every computer nowadays comes pre-installed with a number of fonts made for displaying languages that don’t use the Latin alphabet (Latin alphabet = The alphabet in which this very article is displayed). Prominent examples for languages that don’t use the Latin alphabet are Asian languages such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Thai, etc. Other examples include the Arabic, Brahmic, and Cyrillic script. But there are many more fonts for a myriad of non-Latin alphabets. These fonts were optimized to make the characters of their languages easily readable.

However (and this is why I’ve written this entire section) they usually also contain Latin characters to be able to display the occasional foreign word.

Hence, you might want to honour your roots by using a font in your thesis that was made for your native language, by someone from your home country. It is tempting, because all the Latin characters are there, right? I completely understand this wish, but I strongly advise against it since there are some serious drawbacks.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not throwing shade on these fonts, they are fantastic at what they were made for. Displaying long stretches of text in the Latin alphabet, however, is not one of those things. Let me explain why.

They don’t offer all necessary characters

Firstly, fonts made to display languages with a non-Latin alphabet contain the bare minimum of Latin characters. That is, the basic letters and the most important punctuation marks. Hence, they don’t have all those math operators and special characters I talked about in the section about serif fonts.

Also, the Latin characters in these fonts are usually sans-serif, so less suitable for long text.

But let’s say the non-Latin alphabet font you chose does offer all special characters and has serifs. Unfortunately, they are still not suitable to use in your PhD thesis, for the following reasons:

They are often too small or large for use with greek letters

Do you mention β-Mercaptoethanol or α-Histidin antibodies in your Materials and Methods? Or any other Greek letter? Since Latin characters are scaled differently in fonts made for non-Latin alphabets, Greek letters will not be the same size as the rest of the text anymore. For example, look at this text, where I rendered everything (I swear!) in the specified font size:

In the first panel (Cambria), the Greek letters are the same size and weight as the main text. As I have said, Cambria is one of the fonts explicitly recommended for your thesis. If you look closely at the enlarged line on the bottom of the panel, you can see that the alpha is the same height as the lower-case letters, whereas the beta is the same height as the upper-case letters. It looks neat and tidy.

However, by using a non-Latin font for your PhD thesis, you are asking for trouble.

In the second panel, I show Cordia New, a font for Thai script. At 12 pt, it is way smaller than the Latin font. The Greek letters – which are also at 12 pt! – stand out awkwardly. Also, Cordia New produces a line distance that is larger than it should be when using it for a text in the Latin alphabet.

In the last panel I show Microsoft YaHei for displaying Hanzi characters. Here, the Latin characters are larger. This leads to the Greek letters being too small. And, as you can see in the second and third lines of the paragraph of text, the line distance is quite narrow. However, the Greek letter β requires a regular line distance. So, it pushes the following line down, making the paragraph look uneven.

They don’t offer ligatures

Now, what on earth are ligatures? I could dive into the history of book printing here but I’ll spare you those details. In essence, Ligatures are two or more letters that are printed as one single glyph. Let me show you:

In the top line, you can see that the characters inside the boxes “melt” into each other. This single shape made out of several letter is called a ligature. They are mostly common with the small letter f. If you take a magnifying glass and look at the pages of a novel, you will quickly find these same ligatures. E-readers also display ligatures. Heck, even WhatsApp does it!

Ligatures also make the text easier to read. However, in order to display them, a font actually has to have the glyphs for the ligatures. And many fonts don’t. In order to find out whether a font you chose offers them, go to the character map of that font. (In Windows 10, simply click the windows logo in the corner of your screen and start typing the word “character”.) Pick a font in the drop-down menu. Now, search for the word “ligature” in the character map. If the map is empty after this, the font has no ligature glyphs.

All that being said, ligatures are not super important. I just wanted to mention them.

You can still use fonts made for non-Latin alphabets

If you want to honour your roots by way of a font, you can still do this. For example in your thesis title and/or for the chapter start pages.

In a word: Don’t go crazy with those fonts! Let your science do the talking. If you want to see what your thesis could look like with some of the fonts I recommended, check out the example PhD thesis .

Do you want to see a font combination that’s not in the example thesis? Contact me and I’ll set a few pages in your desired font, free of charge!

Click here for help with your PhD thesis layout!

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Blog / Presentation Design / The 10 best presentation fonts to transform your next PowerPoint.

The 10 best presentation fonts to transform your next PowerPoint.

Welcome to our new presentation font dating show: What’s your type? Starting with ten eligible font choices, you’ll get to know your future font intimately. Based on purpose and personality, you’ll whittle the list down before making your final decision and running off into the sunset with the font of your dreams. 

With over 600,000 fonts on  What Font Is  alone, the term choice paralysis doesn’t quite cover the sweat-inducing panic that accompanies picking just one font for your PowerPoint presentation. How do you even begin to narrow them down and find the best font for your needs? Do you choose based on the name you like most? Perhaps you simply keep returning to your ex font, even though you two clearly have communication issues? Or maybe you just close your eyes and see which your mouse lands on?

Why isn’t there a tinder for fonts?

You obviously can’t be trusted to make this decision on your own. Which is why we’ve done the legwork for you, rounding up ten beautiful, brilliant, and personality-packed font choices for you to choose from.

Enough of the build up.

10 best fonts for presentations

Shall we meet them.

Designed by Matthew Carter, Tahoma is one of Microsoft’s most popular sans serif typefaces.

Another of Matthew Carter’s designs, Verdana is a prime example of a font created specifically for the screen.

Impact gets about a bit. Named as one of the  core fonts for the web , this font has been seen by just about everyone.

Georgia is a nineties gal. Designed for screen, Georgia’s weight fluctuates by a whole pixel, which is greater than traditional print typography.

5. Palatino

Palatino was originally designed for headings and is legible even on the inferior paper of the post-World War II period.

6. Proxima Nova

Proxima Nova is the go-to font for just about anything. Oh, it’s flexible alright.

7. ITC Souvenir

This personable little number gets along with loads of other fonts, just ask Futura and Roboto.

8. Montserrat

A Buenos Aires export, old posters and signs in the artist’s hometown inspired the creation of this 30-year old stunner.

Initially created by Matt McInerney as a single-weight font, but my, my, has Raleway come a long way since then.

Lato was originally betrothed to a large corporate client, but they decided to go in another direction, so now it’s back on the public market, and looking for Mr Right.

The best font for your PowerPoint presentation is somewhere in this selection, just waiting for you to choose it. How does that feel? 

Well, I’m excited. Let’s get cut-throat and start removing the fonts that just aren’t right for you.

Round one: Finding a presentation font with purpose

Fonts are much more than a pretty (type)face to look good sitting on your PowerPoint slide. They have strengths and weaknesses, just like any of us. In order to choose your perfect font, you first need to decide which one fits your purpose. All relationships are chosen based on practicalities, right?

Do you want a simple life, or something a little extra?

Understanding your ultimate goal isn’t just important when it comes to  writing your story . The final deliverable, audience, and even the room layout all need to be taken into account when choosing your font. After all, if they can’t read your message, what’s the likelihood they’re going to remember it?

There are two main font categories for you to decide between: serifs and sans serifs. There are others, such as script and stencil, but we’re trying to keep this simple. Both serifs and sans serifs have their own benefits and specified use cases, making it easy to find the right font category for your need. Let’s start with serifs.

Could a sophisticated serif be the best font for your presentation?

Serifs are the little extra flourishes that sit at the ends of the larger strokes. They likely came about because the Romans would first paint the outlines onto stone before carving, and the paint brushes would create flares at the ends. Serif fonts more closely represent handwriting and, therefore, are universally acknowledged to be easier to read in print. The serifs create joins between letters, similar to how we’re taught to write in school.

Traditionalists will tell you that serif fonts should only be used for print, but we say that’s nonsense. In fact, serifs have made a  huge comeback , have taken over the web, and are in some damn trendy presentations.

We don’t recommend using serif fonts for body copy, as they aren’t always the clearest, but for titles, or as a supporting font, they can work nicely to liven up your slides, while delivering that touch of class some of you might be looking for. 

If you strip your slides right back to just powerful key statements, you want to draw the eye to the title, or your PowerPoint is destined to be printed, congratulations, you’ve just narrowed down your choices.

Our sassy serifs are:

ITC Souvenir

Certain about serifs? Feel free to  jump to the next section .

Or is a simple sans serif the best font for your presentation?

If you want to keep your options open, let’s bring in our sans serif sensations.

Are you looking for something versatile, sleek, and modern for your presentation font? Look no further than our sans serifs. As digital has taken over from print, so too have sans serifs. These font families are considered better for online and screen formats. This is because their simplified forms translate well across different screen resolutions. 

But don’t be too quick to jump to a sans, just because your presentation is destined for the screen only. Sure, if you’re going to pack the slides with copy, a sans serif may be your only choice. However, if you want our honest opinion, your best move here is to shift most of that text into your speaker notes. But that’s a lesson for another time. 

If you can’t be sure about the technical specifications of the kit you’ll be presenting on, you don’t know how big the room will be, or you might want to reuse your deck for a variety of purposes, you won’t go too far wrong with a sans serif font for your presentation.

If you want to play it safe with a sans, your remaining font choices are:

Proxima Nova

You may think you have your heart set on a typographical temptress now, but we’re only halfway through the round. There’s much more to presentation purpose than how much copy is on the slide.

Know your presentation font limits

Have you ever spent days crafting a beautiful presentation, just to stand up on the day in front of a nauseating hurricane of copy calamity?

Nobody wants their font to make a scene in front of a crowd so, if your presentation is ever going to be viewed, presented or edited on a machine that isn’t yours, you need to take the innate availability of your font into account. 

Why use system fonts in your presentation?

If you just want an easy life, to be able to take your chosen font anywhere and have them behave appropriately, you’re going to want to stick with a system font. Choosing a system font means it doesn’t matter what machine you, or anyone else, opens your presentation on, it will always look exactly how you meant it to. There’s certainly a place for custom fonts in presentations, but you have to know exactly where that presentation is going, and have the foresight to install the font on every machine that could open it. 

If you want to stay safe with a system, but keep it sassy with a serif, you’ve just narrowed your choices to:

If you’re the type of person that doesn’t like to take any risks, you’re going to want to go for a sans serif system font:

Look at that. We’re getting closer to your perfect match.

Settled on system? Now would be a great time to  jump to round two . Don’t even let your heart be tempted away by those exotic custom fonts.

Custom fonts to make your presentation stand out

We all want to stand out from the crowd, especially if you happen to be just one presentation in a long line your audience is seeing that day. One way to stick out from the onslaught of Arial is to use a custom font. When we say custom, we don’t necessarily mean you have to pay a typographer to create one just for you. But you could.

No, if you use a custom font, you just open your presentation possibilities up to the whole world of fonts, beyond what can be found on all machines, as standard. 

If you have complete control over everywhere your presentation lands, and can install your font in all these locations, you have the freedom to get a little more creative with your copy.

Want to go custom, but stay classy? Your serif font is:

Boom! Decision made. However, you may still want to  jump to part two to take the personality test, before you put a ring on it.

Prioritising versatility, but happy to be vigilant? Your sans choices are:

By now, I know you have a favourite. Before we finally get to hear from our fonts, let’s make sure you have all the information you need to get your chosen one to the finish line.

How to install custom fonts in PowerPoint

Start by downloading the font. The font you choose will determine which online location you need to visit to source it. Some reliable sites are  Google Fonts ,  Font Squirrel ,  Da Font , and  Font Fabric . 

Installing your fonts on Windows

Find the font file that you downloaded. It’s probably in a zip file and located in your downloads folder.

Double-click  the font file and it will open in the Font Previewer.

Click Install  at the top left.

Installing your font on Mac

Find the font file you downloaded. It likely has a .ttf or .otf extension and it’s probably in your downloads folder.  Double-click  on it.

NOTE: If the font file has a .zip extension you need to open that .zip file and open the font file from there.

It will open in the Font Previewer.  Click Install Font  to open in Font Book.

In Font Book, drag and drop the font to Windows Office Compatible to make it available to Microsoft Office.

After you’ve installed the font, whether on Mac or PC, you need to restart PowerPoint for it to appear in your font list, ready to use.

Round two: How to avoid a personality clash

You’ve used your noggin and picked some practical choices. Now it’s time to bring in the heart. 

The font you use for your PowerPoint presentation says so much more than the copy it’s used for. Fonts convey emotion, they have personalities and, when used right, they help to visually tell your brand story. After all, you wouldn’t write a formal tender document in Comic Sans, would you?

No, you’d choose something that communicates respect and integrity, such as Bodoni or Optima.

But these guys are just gatecrashers. Back to the main event.

Let’s hand over to  our  fonts, so you can get to know them a little better.

First up, our reliable system fonts.

“I’m pretty neutral. The Switzerland of fonts. My personality may not be wacky enough for some, but I’m always up to have some good, clean fun.

I go with anything, complementing whatever design style you’ve chosen, rather than trying to stamp my personality all over it.

Some call me boring, I like to think I’m agreeable. After all, is your presentation really about me?”

“I’m a modern font with an air of innocence. Clean cut, yet retaining just enough personality to liven up your presentation, I will add a dash of character without stealing the show.

I’ve been described as “cheap”, but I prefer to think of myself as simple. I stand back to let your message shine through.”

“Want to make a statement? I’m the font for you. 

My popularity hasn’t made me any less  impactful .

I may be heavy and condensed in style, but I look great in all caps and am effortless to read.  

Big, bold, and powerful; when you’re with me, no one in the room will be able to take their eyes off you.”

“I may be traditional, but traditions stick around for a reason. I’m sophisticated, certain, confident and reliable. Yes, I prefer to err on the side of practicality, over flamboyance, but if you’re looking for someone to take to a formal occasion, I’m the font for you. After all, people often describe me as looking “expensive”.

With such high contrast between my weights, ample letter spacing and clever design, your message will come across, loud and clear.

Want to put some power behind your presentations? I don’t mean to brag, but my bold is significantly more bold than your average. 

To put it simply: I’m a classic.”

“Pfft. A classic? A relic, you mean. Who wants classic, when you can have modern classic?

I’m popular among professionals, as my sharp edges add a dash of character, without getting too crazy. 

Originally designed for headings, I can certainly stand out from a crowd, but my open counters and carefully-weighted strokes mean I also look great as body copy.”

Phew, things are certainly heating up around here. Before you make your final choice, let’s not forget about our custom contestants.

“Now, now, please don’t be intimidated by my beauty. 

I may be stunning, but I’m so much more. I have so many different weights, I might just be the most versatile font around. You can take me to any occasion, and I will adapt.

As a premium find, I don’t come cheap, but if you have a subscription to Adobe, you can get me through  Adobe Fonts , at no extra cost. Consider this your lucky day.” 

“I am so in right now. By choosing me you will instantly freshen up your slides and add relevance to your designs.

I combine the traditional elegance of a serif with a so-hip-it-hurts retro 90s vibe. I’m curvy in all the right places and will catapult your presentation into the here and now, without losing the credibility that comes with a classic serif.”

I’m a reaaaaal solid font. A hipster classic.

If you want a font that complements your check shirt, I’m your guy.” 

“What do you need to know about me? Well, I’m thicc. 

If you’re looking for something chunky and bold, look no further. 

Oh, you’re not? Wait, please don’t go.

I can be sleek and thin for your text pull outs, too.

Or just a regular type for body copy.

I’m diverse and eager to please. Just let me know what you need, and I’ll find a solution for you.”

“You can’t judge a book by its cover, and you can’t presume to know a font on first glance.

To the untrained eye, I might look like any other sans serif font, but just get to know me and you’ll see my originality shine through.”

And that’s everyone. Now that you’ve met our fonts, all that’s left for us to do is ask the big question…

What’s your type?

You have everything you need to make a smart decision about the best font for your PowerPoint presentation, but your adventure together is only just beginning.

Here are some more tips to get the most out of your new beau.

Perhaps one font isn’t enough?

There are many reasons that you might want to use more than one font in a presentation, however, ain’t nobody got time to pick a pair through trial and error. That’s why you come to us for our sweet presentation design services , right?

Usually, a font with a big personality paired with a more conservative font works well. Pairing a serif with a sans serif can create a nice contrast, but remember to use the sans serif for heavy body copy, as you want it to be legible. You can have a little more fun with your header type, as this tends to be larger, with more space to breathe.

Avoid pairing types that are too similar. If they aren’t distinguishable from each other it can look like you just made a mistake.

If you found it hard to decide which font to choose earlier, pairing two fonts is your chance to have your cake and eat it too. 

Some examples of good couples are:

ITC Souvenir works really well with Roboto and Futura. Roboto and Futura are classic fonts, but they don’t come native to Microsoft Office, so they will need downloading and installing.

Alternatively, our curvaceous ITC Souvenir sits pretty as a picture next to a simple font, like Proxima Nova.

Raleway works with Playfair Display, a beautiful serif font that’s available free from Google Fonts.

Montserrat, which was designed specifically for use online, works perfectly with an old-school classic, like Courier New. The light, modern feel of Montserrat contrasts beautifully with the retro, typewriter vibe of Courier New.

Or you could pair Impact with Tahoma, or even Lato, for a perfect presentation font combo.

If you’re unsure, play it safe. Choose a typeface with lots of weight variations (like Open Sans below), and pair fonts from the same family. After all, they were created to work together. Just make sure there’s enough contrast to make the two types distinguishable.

Finally, don’t go crazy with your number of fonts. You can be a little greedy and get away with it, but at some point, they’re all just going to start fighting one another for your affections. As a general rule for presentations, there should be no more than three or four variations in type, weight or effect. That means you can usually get away with two different typefaces. You can then bold, italicise or change the weight for the remaining variations.

How do my fonts look to other people?

We know what’s really important to you. It’s not whether you like your font choice, not really. You care that your message is communicated clearly and effectively to your audience, and your use of type plays a part in this. Here are a few tricks you can use to make sure the message you’re sending out into the world is the right one.

Be bold to stand out

Use italics to  stress  a point or to indicate a publication, such as;  How to choose the best font for your PowerPoint presentation .

A lot of people like to use  bold  to make their key information stand out. But be careful. If you embolden too many things, what’s important gets lost in a sea of bold.

We don’t see a lot of underlines these days, do we? This is something you can use to your advantage. If you have a word or phrase that really needs some bite, throw a lone underline in there for maximum impact. 

Get in line

It is really important to be consistent with your alignment choice. If your alignment jumps from left to right, to centre, back to right, the likelihood is your audience aren’t following. It makes it difficult for them to know where their eye should go, and it can make them feel pretty seasick. 

Left-aligned text is the easiest to read. In  the West , this is the most commonly-used alignment, as we read left to right. It also creates a clean left edge for our eyes to return back to, once we reach the end of the previous line. It’s like a typewriter, always returning to the same point.

Right-aligned text is usually used for decoration, or to accompany a logo. It’s not very easy to read when in large blocks, because your eyes have to do summersaults to find the beginning of the line again.

Centred text works for small snippets of text, such as posters and book covers. Like with right alignment, your eyes will struggle to follow from line to line, if it’s any more than a few sentences.

Justified text is generally acknowledged as a sure-fire way to create order. However, it can be difficult to get right. Justified text makes the words fit a pre-determined line length, by changing the distance between each word. This means each line has a sharp, consistent edge, but can create big white spaces between words called ‘rivers. Justified text can be particularly difficult for people with dyslexia to read, as the ‘rivers’ distract from the actual text.

Optimise your copy

The optimum line length for presentation copy is 50 characters. This allows the eye to keep track of where the next line starts, so the jump back is seamless.

One of the biggest peeves when it comes to working with typography in presentations is untidy sentence endings. We’re not talking about ending with a preposition, it’s only really dull people that care about that. We’re referring to how a body of text is shaped.

Avoid raggedy paragraph structures, which cause your, otherwise beautiful, design to look untidy and unfinished.

If you’re using left-aligned text, look out for any big gaps or words that hang off the end of the line. Try using a soft return to move them around, as this creates less space between lines than a hard return and notifies the brain that you’re still within the same paragraph.

The lonely hearts club

This is all great advice, until you add in the complication of widows and orphans.

A widow is a lonely word with a line all to itself. You can fix this with that soft return trick, knocking a word or two down from the line above. Your widow won’t be so lonely anymore.

An orphan is when that single word, or a single line, causes you to have to start a new column, or a new slide entirely. Again, either editing your copy or adjusting the structure of the whole paragraph will fix this.

Try to strike a balance between the perfect paragraph shape, and removing your widows and orphans. If you have to make the call, it’s better to have a ragged line than a widow.

Not enough information for you?

As you can see, when working to plan your idyllic future with your new partner in presentations, there’s quite a lot to get your head around. For more tips on creating beautiful slides, check out our  presentation design cheat sheet , explore more system font choices with our  comprehensive overview of what’s available , or get in touch to set up your very own, exclusive episode of  What’s your type?

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Scientific Fonts: How to Select the Right One

Choosing the right font for the right kind of content is imperative, this article will aid your decision when it comes to scientific fonts.

It can be very difficult to choose the ideal font for a project, as any graphics designer could confirm. Deciding the font becomes more important when you anticipate its extensive and frequent usage.

It’s an essential part of typography , which is the art of making your design appear visually cohesive. A font group’s general design usually kicks off the search, but with a little digging, you can find yourself in the creator’s most detailed selection.

There are a number of research studies that have focused on typography to discover some good grounds for selecting a particular font for a particular project category.

It is also best to pick a professional font that is easy to read without many extraneous features.

Scientific research, for example, should be written in such a manner that the reader focuses on the information, not just the format.

Some people find today’s scientific fonts boring and overdone. Because of their legibility and simplicity, these fonts are everywhere. Use a trusted font to make your work appear professional.

In terms of font selection, there are more considerations than seem to be apparent at first glance. For instance, some fonts have a reputation for being legitimate, while others don’t.

We have a handful of scientific findings to share throughout this article in the hopes that they will aid your decision-making when it comes to scientific fonts.

If you have ever found the choice of fonts intimidating, the purpose of this article is to offer guidance and information to help you make a decision.

What is the importance of Fonts?

When a typeface is carefully chosen, it is able to deliver the desired effect to the reader, and give the words the sense of life they deserve, all the while reflecting the field it represents.

The font represents the words on a page visually instead of an image, allowing the words to convey their intended meanings as they are read. A font that is too large or small may not convey the seriousness of some issues or messages.

What is the most recent time that you wrote a text or sent an email and the words were read incorrectly? We can communicate more effectively using our vocal tonality, simple hand gestures and expressions, we can convey our message more effectively than simple words on a paper.

On fancy documents such as invitations, using a script font can be spectacular, but on children’s books it can look off, and in the event of too much text it may not be readable.

As you can see, choosing the right font for the right kind of content is very important. However, using the right font is only part of the equation. Misleading fonts result in incorrect information.

7 fonts that strengthen scientific research’s credibility and professional appearance

In recent years, fonts.com has reported that Arial is among the most used typefaces. With its distinctly contemporary design, Arial is more in sync with the last decade of the twentieth century than many of its predecessors.

There is no horizontal line at the bottom of the edges of Arial letters. They are angled instead. It helps give the face a more organic appearance by cutting the terminals on a diagonal.

The Arial family of typefaces is incredibly robust. Suitable for setting text for reports, articles, publications, and for use in display media, newspapers, and promotional materials.

Whether you’re writing small or large chunks of text, Arial makes reading easy. Figures should be formatted in Arial or Helvetica as per Nature’s instructions.

Labels and legends in particular benefit from this typeface. As a rule of thumb, keep font sizes small *8 points when using Arial for figure legends.

2. Baskerville

Designed by John Baskerville in 1757, Baskerville is a typeface that can be read easily and looks good in print.  The letters were straightforward and elegant according to Baskerville.

Here and there, Baskerville font was found to increase reliability of text in comparison to other fonts. The readers’ behavior on the same study was most negatively influenced by Comic Sans.

The Baskerville family of fonts are known as the first transitional roman. These fonts distinguish between thin and thick strokes. The large size of Baskerville looks good because of this feature.

Based on its serif style, Baskerville has “tails” on the edges of its letters. This font is best suited for printing. For long text blocks, it is most suitable.

For best results, try to keep the font size between 8 and 14 points. Then your text will look more professional.

3. Helvetica

The most commonly used font is Helvetica. Max Miedinger, a Swiss designer, initially created Helvetica in 1957.

Designed to be simple to read, the font immediately gained popularity. It is named after the Latin term for Switzerland, Helvetia. Neue Helvetica is the name of the newer version of the font, which was introduced in 1983.

Even a movie has been made about Helvetica. Helvetica is not only a Hollywood (Indie) font, it looks fantastic on screen and print. 

Science, Nature , and Cell ask for the figure captions to be in Helvetica.  Even though it looks good when printed in small formats, it looks even better when printed in large formats.

It’s hard for authors to keep track of how many figures they’ve labelled with Helvetica now, since that’s what publishers use.

In spite of Georgia’s role in providing clarity at low resolutions on the screen, it is imbued with a typographic aesthetic that strikes a chord with readers.

This friendly face is evident even at small sizes. A stunning, smooth italic accompanies Georgia’s design; the artwork minimizes the complexity of making a screen-friendly italic.

As opposed to many contemporary typefaces, it has authentic italics, including the slender lowercase letters a and g.

The bold weight is also carefully tailored, with a heavier weight than the regular; this is particularly useful at small screen sizes where the two weights must be distinguished(phone screens).

5. Garamond

The history of this font also dates back a long way. French King Francis I of France (1515-1547) commissioned Claude Garamond to design a typeface for use in a series of books.

It was revived by Robert Slimbach in 1989 as an electric typeface. Garamond comes in many different variations because there are different sources available. The most commonly used version is Adobe Garamond.

French publishers continue to use Garamond extensively. Size 9 is also a must for Garamond in France.  The history of France’s publishing industry is published in Garamond, as is Histoire de l’édition française . 

This font was chosen due to its elegance, opulence, and legibility as well as a simple layout highlighting the detailed writing and offer an enlightened insight on the contemporary aspect of the content.

In long documents such as thesis papers, dissertations, and academic books, Garamond is a reliable font to use. Garamond is the font that many master’s thesis writers use.

Among the long-established fonts is Caslon. The typeface was designed in the early 1700s by William Caslon. English typefaces began with this one. It was a common font used in colonial America, and even the US Declaration of Independence was written with this font.

Because there is no enforceable trademark on the name “Caslon”, there are many typefaces called “Caslon”, some of which are exact copies of the originals, while others are not.

It is best used in blocks of text since it is a serif font (with tails). If you want best results, keep the font size between 8 and 14 points, as you would with Baskerville. The best place to make use of this would be in an application or a report.

7. Times New Roman

First published by The Times of London newspaper in 1932, this typeface was designed for the publication.

In the years since, it has evolved into one of the most popular typefaces in the world. Victor Lardent at The Times created the original designs under the direction of Stanley Morison.

Monotype’s Type Drawing Office then further refined it in an extensive step-by-step process. Many of its characteristics were taken from Morison’s experiments with Perpetua and Plantin, but it was adapted so that it was highly readable and also very efficient.

There are vast uses for it in books and journals, in reports, in presentations, and in advertising.

Is there anything else you need to think about when selecting the right font?

When choosing a font, there are a number of things to keep in mind besides these categories. For example, does it have all the features you are looking for?

You may be able to get away with just using the letters of the alphabet for the first piece, but what if you have to write a quick article for the public?

Are there symbols such as a currency symbol or exclamation point in the text? Especially when you are submitting a funding proposal. (Read our guide to everything you need to know about Research Proposals .)

Every once in a while, we find ourselves trying to add a price but the symbol we need isn’t there.

As well as the font size, there are other considerations, such as does it come in many sizes and styles or are only light, regular and bold available?

If you don’t have a lot of specifics, that’s alright, but you should take into account a broader perspective and what you intend to accomplish.

When it comes to communicating your message, different font sizes can be really helpful. Despite the fact that it’s good to have different typefaces, there is a rule that suggests only using a maximum of three typefaces in one contribution.

If you use any more than that, you risk-taking away the emphasis of what is being said. Complementary fonts are important, but they shouldn’t be too similar as this could result in a cluttered look that could be confusing.

Lastly, when picking a font, we should consider the print aspects to ensure it will be easy to read. These factors include colour, size, and style. The most decorative script fonts may look good, but they aren’t always a good option.

Hence, make sure to put into consideration every possible aspect of the information that may be published around the world through various mediums.

How to use Scientific fonts?

A reader’s primary objective should be to understand the facts about your project clearly. An easy-to-read document will help you achieve that goal.

The editors of newspapers, as well as publishers of journals, have developed many guidelines to make text more readable. These guidelines are now available for scientific purposes.

• Keep the main body text font size at least 16 points . Any smaller would make the text difficult to read.
• A project title should have a minimum height of 2 inches.
• It is recommended that headlines have at least one inch tall letters .
• If you want to stay with the norm, use Arial , Times New Roman , or another typeface similar to these.
• If you intend to draw attention to anything, use italics or boldface .
• Place your text below your picture ; that makes it easier to read.
• Please refrain from using ALL CAPS ; they can be difficult to perceive.
• You should not use reverse typeface (light text on dark background).
• If you type in a script font, avoid using artistic fonts , since they are harder to follow.
• You can choose between Serif or Sans Serif depending on the medium or the audience you will be addressing to.
• Your poster or paper should not contain more than two or three contrasting fonts .
• For body copy and headings, Time New Roman and Arial combine nicely.

Please note that every journal or publication house has different guidelines based on how they handle submissions, so make sure you check them.

It is also important to consider the medium on which the text will appear when choosing a font. Posters will need to have better fonts that appear decent when printed.

Selecting the wrong font can negatively affect future decision-making. It is important to remember that the typeface that you select to present your research or information will have a major impact on its effectiveness.

Make sure you make the right choice because it will leave a meaningful impression on the reader. (You can learn how to create an outstanding presentation that will leave the audience impressed, here )

Fonts for scientific illustrations and infographics

Infographics, or informational graphics, are a growing trend in data presentation. This style of presentation allows you to convey your message quickly and easily.

In order to make complex topics understandable, illustrations are extremely useful. A good font is essential no matter what.(See our guide to scientific illustrations )

Your choice of font is as important as the research itself when it comes to presenting it. (In most cases.) Generally, book, journal, and newspaper fonts are serif fonts, which are characterized by small lines at the end of each stroke .

The vast majority of online content uses sans serif fonts. Serif fonts make it easier for readers to follow lines of text, which is certainly useful when designing illustrations or use the infographic maker.

The best typeface for graphic design is sans serif. Arial, Calibri, Helvetica, Verdana, and open sans, which are readily available, improve content legibility significantly.

If you understand how certain font choices affect the composition of your content, deciding on a family of fonts and a typography scheme becomes much more straightforward.

As you become more familiar with the values, tone, and vision of the work, you will begin to can identify what works. It is possible to convey your ideas in a non-verbal and yet powerful way, using fonts.

Now that we have reached our final section, you should also know where to find all the fonts in one place.

You can find all the best science fonts for graphic design at one place

We at mind the graph understand the importance of typography and how it plays an integral part in representation of scientific ideas. Mind the graph, the most user-friendly tool.

Scientists and academicians from over 100 top academic, educational, and industrial institutions trust Mind the Graph. This is why everything is up-to-date and scientifically sound.

You will find all the A to Z fonts you need for all things scientific here. Besides that, we also suggest fonts that are appropriate for your content type. You can choose from the list we have.

Furthermore, we have many templates to assist in the creation of posters and graphics. Additionally, they can be customized according to your needs. However, guess what is even better than that? We offer a FREE trial, so you can decide what plan fits you best. 

When you join, you join us in our mission to increase easy access to the best science tool for as many people as possible. Our blog section has a variety of information about everything from making Science posters to a list of the best science podcasts of 2022, definitely worth checking out.

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About Fabricio Pamplona

Fabricio Pamplona is the founder of Mind the Graph - a tool used by over 400K users in 60 countries. He has a Ph.D. and solid scientific background in Psychopharmacology and experience as a Guest Researcher at the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry (Germany) and Researcher in D'Or Institute for Research and Education (IDOR, Brazil). Fabricio holds over 2500 citations in Google Scholar. He has 10 years of experience in small innovative businesses, with relevant experience in product design and innovation management. Connect with him on LinkedIn - Fabricio Pamplona .

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5 fonts that add credibility and professionalism to scientific research

by ikumikayama | Apr 29, 2013 | Uncategorized | 14 comments

Choosing the right fonts can affect how your scientific research is received.

Note: This is part 2 of a 2-part blog series about choices in fonts. You can read part 1 here .

You are dressed in your best. You edited the manuscript with a fine-tooth comb…but are your figures and images wearing flip-flops?

Last time we talked about fonts that suck professionalism out of your scientific research . In this article, we’ll talk about fonts that actually add credibility and professionalism to your research. Dress your research in a custom-tailored suit by just using these fonts!

My friend and colleague, Cassio Lynm described how a good figure should be like a billboard found in many highways around the country. Anyone who sees the billboard will understand what they are advertising in a split second. If someone is confused or gets the wrong idea, the image is not very successful.

Similarly, the best professional fonts should be one that’s easy to read with very little “bells and whistles”. When writing prose of informational value such as scientific research, a reader should pay attention to what the text is describing, not how the text looks.  A good professional font should be like air–we don’t really even pay attention to it most of the time.

Some of the fonts I’ll share with you today are considered “boring” and “overused” by some. These fonts are everywhere because they are champions of legibility and simplicity.  Make your work professional and trustworthy by using a time-tested font.

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1. Arial- “All-Around Champion with IBM Roots”

According to fonts.com , Arial is one of the most used typefaces of the last 30 years. Its electronic origins go back to 1982 for IBM laser-xerographic printers by designers Robin Nicholas and Patricia Saunders. When it came out, it was supposed to compete with Helvetica, which was one of the core fonts in Apple Computers in the mid 1980’s.

Arial letters have more round shapes and the edges of letters do not end in a horizontal line. Instead, the edges are at an angle.

Arial is an easy-to-read font in small and large blocks of text. Nature requests that the figure text be in Arial or Helvetica. It’s especially nice for figure labels and legends. When using Arial as figure legends, keep the font size small ~8 points for best results.

2. Helvetica- “All-Around Champion with Apple Roots”

Helvetica is the most heavily-used font. Helvetica was originally designed by a Swiss designer named Max Miedinger in 1957. The font was designed to be an easy-to-read font. The name “Helvetica” comes from “Helvetia” – Latin name for Switzerland. Actually, the font received a facelift in 1983-the newer version is called, you guessed it, Neue Helvetica.

Helvetica even has its own movie . I haven’t seen it yet, but please comment in the section below if you have.

Besides its Hollywood (Indie) status, Helvetica is a font that looks great on both print and on screen.  Nature , Science , and Cell request that their figure labels be in Helvetica. (If you need assistance setting up figures, I’m here to help). It looks great small as in figure labels, and it looks pretty good in large formats as posters. I lost count of how many figures I labeled using Helvetica, since that’s what one of the publishers used for their books.

3. Baskerville- “Tends to have positive influence on readers”

Baskerville’s history goes all the way back to 1757 when John Baskerville designed a typeface that works well in print and easy to read.  Mr. Baskerville preferred his letters simple and refined. He was also a writing master, so he had some ornamental letters like the upper case Q.

There was an  informal study  (not official, but some experiments here and there) that showed using Baskerville font increased trustworthiness of the text compared to other fonts. In the same study, Comic Sans had the most negative influence on the readers.

Baskerville is a serif font, which means that there are “tails” at the edge of the letters. Generally, serif fonts are better suited for print. This font works best when used in long blocks of text. Try to keep this font between 8 and 14pts for best results. This font looks dignified, so use this for your important professional occasions-award ceremonies, recognitions, etc.

4. Caslon- “When in doubt, use Caslon”

Caslon is another font with a long history. William Cason I designed the typeface back in the early 1700’s. This font is considered as the first original typeface from England. This font was very popular in colonial America, and it was used for many historical documents including the US Declaration of Independence.

Caslon is a serif font (with tails), and is best used in blocks of text. Like Baskerville, try to keep this font between 8 and 14 points for best results. Using this in a report or an application would be a good places.

5. Garamond – “Second best font after Helvetica”

This font’s history also goes way back. The font was designed by Claude Garamond (or Jean Jannon), who was commissioned to make a typeface for King Francis I of France (1515-47) to be used in series of books. The modern, electric version was revived in 1989 by Robert Slimbach.

Because there are different sources available for Garamond, there are numbers of different variations of the font. Adobe Garamond is the most popular and widely-available version today.

Garamond is still used extensively by French publishers. They also insist that Garamond be printed in size 9.  Some of the most famous publications in France are in Garamond such as Histoire de l’édition français.  The publishers prefer this font “for its beauty, its richness and its legibility” combined with “an uncluttered graphic style that underscores the rigour of essays and analysis providing a radical critique of contemporary society”.

Garamond is a great font to be used in long proses such as textbooks, dissertations and theses. Keeping it at 9 point is optional. In fact, my master’s thesis was in Garamond.

So that’s the 5 fonts that add credibility and professionalism to your scientific research. Did you find your favorite fonts here? Do you have other favorites? Please share your thoughts in the comment section. Also, please feel free to send this article along to those who might benefit from this short article.

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Now that you know about great scientific fonts, learn more about: PowerPoint Tips for the Scientist

Sources and Further reading:

Arial vs Helvetica – fonts.com

Research on font trustworthiness: Baskerville vs. Comic Sans

Caslon typeface

History of Garamond

Cell Press Figure Guide

Nature -Guide to preparing final artwork

Science Magazine: Preparing your manuscript

14 Comments

I’d rather like to know which font was used to write that article – it’s simple and readable, better than all presented above.

And the font being used for that article is Helvetica, which is one of the fonts mentioned above 😀

Hi Ewa! Great point. The font used is called “Open Sans” by Steve Matteson. For my blog, I made the font color dark grey to make it easier on the eyes, and also made them slightly bigger than average for easier reading. Hope this helps!

Hollo there, i liked the article but none of this fonts looks like the one used in the papers i read, (Journals of the American Chemical Society), do you know which one they use?

Hi There! Thank you for the note! ACS suggests Arial and Helvetica for their journal figures, so that’s what I introduced in this article–for the text, they might very well have their own custom font they use for their publications. I’ll dig into this a little deeper–thank you again!

I’m sorry, but this article is full of misinformation. Part 1 is a reiteration of articles that have been around for years. Absolutely nothing new there, and honestly, is there anyone even considering the typefaces you name there for scientific articles? Is it conceivable that anyone would use Curlz for his essay?

But my real concern goes to the second part. Arial and Helvetica are absolutely not scientific typefaces. The notion that ACS suggests these typefaces doesn’t make them suitable for scientific works. I think you ought to do research as to WHY these typefaces came recommended. Helvetica has history, as it won out of contemporaries like Univers as Helvetica was very heavily marketed. As a side note, Helvetica is actually based on the Akzidenz Grotesk model. Arial was designed to have the same metrics as Helvetica so it could be used on the same printers without having to pay a license fee to use Helvetica. Arial is more legible while Helvetica is more neutral and clear, but neither is particularly great.

So I would say Helvetica and Arial haven’t been chosen because they’re perfect. They’ve been chosen because they’re popular, and Arial is on every Windows computer, so people don’t have to purchase any fonts. I would say neither Arial and Helvetica are known to be particularly good to read. I suspect typefaces like Proxima Nova and Avenir will fair better. To be clear, I don’t think Arial or Helvetica are bad choices for labels and such, but to suggest them as top 5 typefaces, that’s very clearly misinformation.

“When using Arial as figure legends, keep the font size small ~8 points for best results.” For best results? Not entirely. It’s probably a good estimate, but in actuality the pt size should depend on the layout. I would recommend always making a test print to see if the text looks good in print, if that’s what it is intended for. Sometimes 0.2pts more or less could make the difference.

“Helvetica is the most heavily-used font.” I don’t think so. First off, Helvetica is not a font. It’s a typeface. Helvetica Regular would be a font. Helvetica is the most heavily-used typeface in graphic design, and likely the most heavily-used sans typeface. It’s not the most heavily-used typeface. At least, I would be very surprised if it was. I suspect Times New Roman is the most heavily-used.

“The font was designed to be an easy-to-read font.” No, Helvetica was designed to steal the popularity of Akzidenz Grotesk away.

Also, follow this link to see some of the problems of Helvetica at small sizes, and what professionals in the field have to say about it: http://spiekermann.com/en/helvetica-sucks/

“Actually, the font received a facelift in 1983-the newer version is called, you guessed it, Neue Helvetica.” Who would guess that the prefix for the new Helvetica would be German though? Small detail… Anyway, if you like Helvetica but want a more professional typeface (because really, Max Miedinger was not a type designer and as far as I’m concerned that shows), I can recommend Neue Haas Grotesk (a typeface that is true to the original Helvetica, but improved) or Neue Haas Unica (a more fresh looking Helvetica that deviates from the original).

“Helvetica even has its own movie. I haven’t seen it yet, but please comment in the section below if you have.” I have seen it a few times now. It’s quite a pleasure to watch, but there’s a lot of propaganda involved as well. You have the likes of Massimo Vignelli drooling over how great Helvetica is. The man was a pretty great graphic designer (although insisting on always using Helvetica has little to do with graphic design, as one ought to select the perfect typeface for the job, not use one typeface for every job), but he had no insight in type design. On the other hand, you have Erik Spiekermann formulate perfectly what Helvetica stands for. I would say for a type designer the Helvetica documentary is quite pleasant to watch. For the layman I’m afraid the documentary amounts to propaganda. It gives the layman the feeling this is one of the best typefaces out there and it’s simply not, by far.

“Besides its Hollywood (Indie) status, Helvetica is a font that looks great on both print and on screen.” Absolutely not! On Windows computers, websites set in Helvetica tend to look horrendous. The problem is that Helvetica is not well hinted, and so rendering problems occur. Helvetica was obviously not designed for monitors. Neue Helvetica doesn’t have the rendering problem to the same extent I believe, but relatively few people have Neue Helvetica, so it wouldn’t be wise to use that on your website, unless you embed the fonts. For websites I highly recommend using Arial rather than Helvetica.

“Baskerville’s history goes all the way back to 1757 when John Baskerville designed a typeface that works well in print and easy to read.” Easy to read? Not particularly, though it’s not bad either. Baskerville is a transitional typeface, meaning the weight modulation is vertical and the contrast is high. This is the tradition of the Baroque, but it’s not the most pleasant to read. However, Baskerville does look quite academic. For typefaces that are more pleasant to read, I would look at the Garalde style. Garamond and Caslon belong to that classification. They have a diagonal weight modulation, which naturally leads the eyes to the next letters. Typefaces with vertical weight modulation and high contrast tend to feature a fence effect, which disturbs the reading experience. To see this effect well, look at Didone typefaces like Didot and Bodoni.

“This font works best when used in long blocks of text. Try to keep this font between 8 and 14pts for best results.” 14pt seems quite large. Try 9–12pt. This goes for any serif typeface to be used for body text that is intended for print (for the web try 10–14pt, also depending on which device it’s intended for). But again, it will depend on the layout, and always make test prints to make sure it’s pleasant to read.

“Garamond is a great font to be used in long proses such as textbooks, dissertations and theses. Keeping it at 9 point is optional. In fact, my master’s thesis was in Garamond.” I distinctly remember years ago I noticed my Harry Potter book was set in Garamond. Both Garamond and Caslon are still used extensively for books.

However, Garamond may be a bit much for scientific documents. It’s quite classical and it has a low x-height, which these days is not preferable. Caslon is a bit less expressive and has a taller x-height. I would say Caslon is probably better for scientific articles.

One group of typefaces that certainly seems to be missing here is Century. Typefaces like Century Roman and Century Schoolbook. They belong to the Clarendon classification and are reminiscent of typefaces like Baskerville. These typefaces have been popular since the late 19th century and are still used extensively in academic literature. But I suppose you should also make a consideration of whether your article should be about the most comfortable typefaces to read, or the best suitable for scientific work, because they most certainly don’t amount to the same thing, yet you seem to be equating the two in this article.

Hi Martin! Thank you so much for your in-depth note! I have to look over and digest all your excellent points. Would you be open to expanding your writing and be a guest author or send me a link to your website/blog so the readers can have more information about what types to use for their work?

THE quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog!!!!!

Leelawadee is a bit underrated. It is easy on the eyes, and simple. It could use a bit of a TimesNewRoman-punch to it, though.

Where can I download Helvetica from? I couldn’t find it anywhere

Seriously? I don’t know what this smug guy does with typography, in which he seems to be well versed, but if he were to take up writing he would need to work on his grammar.

I’m not an expert on fonts, but I’m currently using Helvetica for headlines and other Sans text in my thesis and DejaVu for the main text. Feels pretty scientific to me 🙂

I enjoyed the historical aspect of this article. Thanks! PS. I see you use a sans serif font.

How i download these font types?

10 Best fonts to use in your next PowerPoint presentation

• Written by: Elly Hughes
• Categories: PowerPoint design
• Comments: 15

The design choices we make in our presentations – the colours, the icons, the photography and illustrations – all form a kind of shorthand through which our audiences recognise our brand and get a feel for the message we’re aiming to communicate. The same goes for the fonts we use. Fonts have as big an impact on design style as the visuals. Beautiful photography and well-designed icons can all be undermined by a poorly-chosen typeface. You need to use a font that aligns with the rest of your design style, and with the personality you’re trying to convey. You need a font with the right ‘voice.’

But how do we pick one? Before we get into our recommendations for 10 of the best presentation fonts, let’s run through some of the questions you can ask to help you decide.

Is it a Windows-standard font?

Before we get started this is probably the most important question to ask is if your font should be Windows-standard.

Free download: If you’re not sure what is Windows-standard and what isn’t, then  download this list of Windows-standard fonts for your reference.

We’ll have a look at custom fonts later in this article, but one last question to ask is if the font you intend to use is Windows-standard. Why does this matter? Well, if you make a beautiful presentation using a custom font and then send it to your colleague who doesn’t have the font installed, their version of the presentation will be a huge mess of mis-sized default fonts that isn’t really fit for purpose.

So, if you’re going to be using your presentation on multiple machines, you need something that will work on all of them – you need a Windows-standard font.

And, in case you were wondering, the ten we recommend here are all on that list.

Are you choosing a font for headings or body text?

The first thing to consider is where your text will be used – does it need to be easily readable in longer paragraphs and smaller sizes? Or can you afford to go bigger? Are you looking for a larger, more impactful slide title?

Whether your font is for heading or body text will help inform your answer to the next question…

Serif or sans serif?

Serif fonts have little ticks or ‘wings’ at the end of their lines, and are usually associated with serious, business-like, intellectual content, whereas sans serif fonts – like this one – have no marks on the ends of their lines, and are usually seen as modern, sleek and clean.

General wisdom is that serif fonts are better for print and for body text, as the serifs lead the eye from one character to the next like joined handwriting. Alternatively, sans serif fonts are better for titles and text displayed on a screen. But these are not hard and fast rules! A popular idea is to choose one of each, perhaps titles will be sans serif and body text will be serif, but it’s up to you – choose what feels right for your brand. Do you want to appeal to tradition, to intellectual weight with a serif font, or do you want your text to feel modern, to speak of technology and progress with a sans serif choice? Which leads to the final consideration…

How much familiarity do you want?

Many of the most popular typefaces already have well established voices. Everyone knows Times New Roman is serious, respectable, reliable. Everyone knows Arial is clear, no-nonsense, professional. If you want your audience to feel the familiarity of these tried and tested fonts, easily done! Or do you want to escape the familiar, be a little bit unique and memorable with a font your audience hasn’t already seen that day?

Once you have the answers to these questions, and have decided on the ‘voice’ you want to convey, you are finally ready to start searching for your font! Read on for our recommendations of 10 of the best fonts you can use for your next presentation.

10 best presentation fonts

1. garamond.

‘Garamond’ actually refers to a style of font, rather than one font in particular. Some examples you may have heard of include Adobe Garamond, Monotype Garamond and Garamond ITC. All of these fonts are slightly different, but all have their origins in the work of Claude Garamond, who designed the original punch cuts in the 1500s, making Garamond fonts some of the oldest around.

Prior to Claude Garamond’s work, fonts were designed to mimic the handwriting of scribes. Garamond’s typefaces however (there are 34 attributed to him), were designed in the Roman style, with the letters’ ascenders vertical and the crossbar of the letter ‘e’ horizontal, instead of slanted as in earlier calligraphic fonts. The letters were designed this way to increase legibility in print, which is what makes Garamond fonts such a great choice for body text. Such a great choice in fact, that the entire Harry Potter series is printed in Adobe Garamond. Outside of print, Garamond fonts have been used in the logos of numerous brands, including Rolex and Abercrombie and Fitch, and giants Google and Apple.

With their rich history and elegant readability, you can be confident that a Garamond font will bring a timeless sophistication to your slides, while keeping your text legible.

2. Palatino

Palatino was designed by Hermann Zapf in 1949. Based on the type styles of the Italian Renaissance, Palatino draws influence from calligraphy, and is in fact named after master calligrapher Giambattista Palatino – a contemporary of Claude Garamond. Zapf intended Palatino for use in headings, advertisements and printing. More specifically, it was designed to remain legible when printed on low quality paper, printed at small size or viewed at a distance.

Palatino Linotype is the version of the font included with Microsoft products, and has been altered slightly from the original for optimum display on screens. Book Antiqua, also a Microsoft default font, is very similar, almost impossible to tell from Palatino Linotype.

Both of these fonts are good choices for body text – a little unusual, they will set your slides apart in a sea of Arial and Times New Roman, while with their airy counters and smooth, calligraphic lines, maintaining elegance and readability.

Verdana was designed by Matthew Carter for Microsoft in 1996, deliberately crafted for use on computer screens. The letters are widely spaced, with wide counters and tall lowercase letters, making this font extremely readable, especially when displayed at small sizes. Verdana is also nearly ubiquitous, it has been included with all versions of Windows and Office since its creation. One survey estimates it is available on 99.7% of Windows computers, and 98.05% of Macs. On the one hand, this makes it a very safe bet – you are almost guaranteed your presentation will appear as you intended on all devices, but on the other hand, you may not stand out from the crowd as much as you may like!

You can’t argue with its legibility though. Verdana is an excellent font to use for small text, for example, to keep your footnotes, references and disclaimers readable. Or, for a safer choice, Verdana’s unobtrusive, effortlessly legible characters will keep your audience’s attention on what you have said, not the font you’ve used to say it.

If you’ve used a Windows computer, used Skype, played on an Xbox 360 or just seen the Microsoft logo, you have seen a font from the Segoe family. Microsoft uses Segoe fonts for its logos and marketing materials, and Segoe UI has been the default operating system font since Windows Vista. This is all down to its beautiful simplicity, and on-screen legibility. Similarly to Verdana, Segoe fonts look perfect on screens and at small sizes, and are warm and inviting while maintaining the airy, aspirational feel of technology and progress. Unlike Verdana though – which has wide spaces and heavier letters – Segoe fonts are also a great choice for titles and headers.

Another fun bonus from the Segoe font family is the expansive set of symbols and icons it offers. From the insert tab in PowerPoint, click symbol, and change the symbol font to either Segoe UI Symbol, or Segoe UI Emoji, and marvel at the reams and reams of symbols to choose from. There are shapes, arrows, musical notes, mathematical notation, scientific notation, there are animals, buildings, food, Mahjong tiles, Fraktur letters, I Ching hexagrams… Likely any symbol you could possibly want is in there!

So for easy to read body text, light, elegant headers, or a quick and easy way to bring just about any icon you can think of into your presentation, the Segoe font family is a perfect choice.

5. Franklin Gothic

What is it that makes a font ‘gothic?’ There’s certainly nothing about Franklin Gothic that speaks of bats in belfries or doomed lovers wandering the Yorkshire moors! Well, confusingly, when describing fonts ‘Gothic’ can mean completely opposite things – it is sometimes used to refer to a Medieval-style, blackletter font, or conversely, it can be used as a synonym for the clean, geometric, sans serif fonts that began their rise to prominence in the early 19 th century. And that’s certainly the category Franklin Gothic fits into.

Designed by Morris Fuller for the American Type Founders in 1902 and named after the American printer and Founding Father Benjamin Franklin, Franklin Gothic is a classic American font that has been described as ‘square-jawed and strong-armed, yet soft-spoken.’ With its wide range of weights and widths, and interesting design details (take a look at the uppercase Q and lowercase g for some beautiful, unusual curves, and the uppercase A and M for subtly varying line weights), Franklin Gothic will look strong and approachable as your headings, and classy and legible as your body text.

Candara was designed by Gary Munch, and released with Windows Vista in 2008. It is part of a family of six Microsoft fonts, all beginning with the letter C (Calibri, Cambria, Consolas, Corbel and Constantia), that were all optimised for use with Microsoft’s ClearType rendering system.

The most interesting thing about Candara, and what makes it such a beautiful font to use, is the influence of architecture on its design. If you look closely at the letters’ ascenders, you will notice an entasis at their ends, which means there is a slight convex curve towards the ends of the lines – a feature best known from classical architecture. Columns built by ancient Greek, Roman, Incan, Aztec and Chinese empires were built with this convex curve, a particularly famous example being the columns of the Parthenon in Athens. Historians believe columns were built in this way to give an impression of greater strength, to correct for the visual illusion that very tall, straight columns appear to bow inwards as they rise.

And the architectural influence doesn’t end there, Candara’s diagonal lines – best seen in the capital X, N and A – have been designed with unusual ogee curves. Most often seen in Gothic arches from 13 th and 14 th century Britain, an ogee curve is part convex, part concave, forming a shallow S shape as it rises. Two ogee curves meeting in the middle form an arch that rises to a point – like Candara’s capital A.

These entases and ogee curves are what makes this font pleasingly unusual. At first glance, it is a standard, easy-to-read sans serif that looks crisp and clear on screen, but on closer inspection, Candara has some interesting design details that set it apart. Candara is perhaps not the most serious looking font, but if you’d like something slightly unusual, but still professional and perfectly legible, consider Candara.

Similarly to Garamond, Bodoni refers not to a single font, but to a family of typefaces inspired by the centuries old work of a master typographer. Giambattista Bodoni was an extremely successful master printer who lived and worked in the Italian city of Parma through the late 18 th and early 19 th century. Along with a French typographer named Firmin Didot, Bodoni was responsible for developing the ‘New Face’ style of lettering, characterised by extreme contrast between thick and razor thin lines.

You will have seen this in action if you have ever glanced at a fashion magazine. Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar and Elle all print their names in a Bodoni font. In fact, these fonts are so prevalent in fashion graphic design that they have become a shorthand for the elegance and refinement the fashion world idealises.

The sharp lines and smooth curves of these fonts have been compared to the precise geometries of fabric patterns, and their delicate, graceful forms afford them a sophisticated femininity. This delicacy also make these fonts perfect for overlaying photographs. You will notice from the fashion magazine covers how the titles maintain their presence, but don’t overpower the photograph beneath. You can use this to great effect in your own designs; if you need to layer text over photographs, Bodoni fonts could be a stylish and sophisticated answer.

Best used in headings displayed at large sizes where contrasting line weights will have maximum impact, Bodoni fonts will instantly instil your design with an effortless, timeless elegance. Bodoni himself wrote that the beauty of type lies in “conformity without ambiguity, variety without dissonance, and equality and symmetry without confusion.” Bodoni fonts have all those things in abundance, and are some of the most beautiful fonts you can choose to use.

If Bodoni fonts are just that bit too extreme, try Bell MT instead. They have similar roots – both Bodoni and Bell fonts were influenced by the work of French typographer Fermin Didot, and have the same ‘New Face’ style contrast between thick and thin lines, just to a lesser extent with Bell fonts.

Designed in 1788 by the punch cutter Richard Austin, commissioned by the publisher John Bell, Bell fonts share similarities with Didot style fonts, but also with softer, rounder Roman fonts of the time such as Baskerville. The influence of flowing, cursive style fonts such as Baskerville can be seen in letters such as the uppercase Q and K, and the italic Y and z , which all have some beautiful, unusual curves. In fact, Bell MT is particularly attractive in italic, almost script-like while maintaining legibility. This makes it an excellent choice for sub-headings, as a softer counterpart to a sans serif heading. Or use it for quotes and testimonials, set in a beautiful Bell italic they will be inviting and authentic, as well as clear and readable.

Coming from an indigenous Salishan language, Tahoma is one of the original Native American names for Mount Rainier in the US state of Washington.

Tahoma the font however was designed by the British typographer Matthew Carter working for Microsoft, and was released with Windows 95. It is a very close cousin of Verdana, but though similar, Tahoma is a little narrower and more tightly spaced than Verdana, giving it a more slender, slightly more formal feel. It is another example of a font that was designed specifically for screen use, meaning it will look good at a wide range of sizes, and on a wide range of screens, perfect if you are making a presentation that will need to display properly on multiple devices.

In fact, perfect clarity is what sets Tahoma apart from some similar sans serif fonts. The image below shows the characters uppercase I (eye), lowercase l (ell) and number 1 (one) written in four popular sans serif fonts (from left to right) Century Gothic, Calibri, Gill Sans and Tahoma. Notice how in every font but Tahoma, at least two characters are indistinguishable. Gill Sans, for example, is a disaster here. It’s unlikely you’ll ever need to write these three characters in quick succession, but for scientific, technical or mathematical content, clear distinction between these characters can be very important – and Tahoma gives you that.

So with its easy to read, screen friendly design and readily distinguishable characters, Tahoma is an ideal choice for the slightly more formal, but still approachable, scientific or technical presentation.

Designed by Jeremy Tankard and released in 2005, like Candara Corbel was also designed to work well with Microsoft’s ClearType rendering system, meaning it is specifically designed to work well on screens. Tankard described his aim when designing Corbel as ‘to give an uncluttered and clean appearance on screen,’ and describes the font as ‘legible, clear, and functional at small sizes.’ All of these things are important boxes to tick when you’re looking for a presentation font!

Corbel is a little more serious than Candara, again in Tankard’s words: ‘functional but not bland,’ designed to be ‘less cuddly, more assertive.’ The dots above the i’s and j’s for example are square, not rounded. The tail of the uppercase Q is straight and horizontal, not a whimsical curve. This makes Corbel a good choice for more serious or technical content, it is legible and without excessive embellishment, yet not characterless or overused.

One of the most interesting design details with Corbel is the fact that with this font, numbers are lowercase. What does this mean? Take a look at the image below, where you can see a comparison of how the numbers 0-9 appear in Corbel with how they appear in another popular sans serif font, Segoe UI. Notice how the Corbel numbers don’t line up exactly? This is know as lowercase or old-style numerals.

The purpose of this is to improve how numbers look when they form part of body text – they are a more natural fit with lowercase lettering. Few fonts have this option (for a serif option offering lowercase numbers, consider Georgia, also a Windows standard font), meaning Corbel can make a for a very unique choice. It will be both legible and readable, and its unusual numbers will add a unique and pleasing design touch to your slides.

What about custom fonts?

Sometimes what we want is not the familiar, the comforting, the Arial and the Times New Roman, sometimes we just want something different . This is your opportunity to step into the almost infinite world of custom fonts. Here you can find fonts to fit almost any imaginable need. From timeless and elegant and crisp and futuristic, to ornate scripts and decorative novelties, there will be a custom font for you.

But a word of warning on non-system fonts – custom fonts can be a powerful, attractive component of your presentation design, but if used incorrectly, they can also be its undoing.

A custom font will only appear in your presentation if it is played on a device with that font installed . On any other device, PowerPoint will replace your beautiful, carefully planned custom font with one of the system defaults, and this can have disastrous consequences for your design.

If your presentation is going to be built and presented exclusively from the same device you shouldn’t have a problem, but if multiple devices or operating systems are involved, or if you intend to share your presentation for others to use, to ensure your fonts survive the jump it is safer to stay in the realms of the system default fonts. There you can be confident your carefully crafted designs will stay exactly as you envisaged them, and you can concentrate on delivering the very best presentation.

You can find a useful PDF here detailing which fonts are available on all platforms for maximum compatibility.

Whatever font you do choose for your next PowerPoint presentation, ask yourself two questions:

• Does this font have the right ‘voice’ for your brand?
• Is it easy to read?

If the answer to both of the above is yes, then you are on to a winner. You know best what fits with your brand, and if a font captures your unique voice, and makes your slides easy for your audience to read, you are one step closer to that perfect presentation.

Further reading

For more advice on choosing the best font for your next presentation, and then making the very best of it in your design, take a look at our other articles:

• 10 typography tips and tricks to get you started
• Advanced typography in PowerPoint
• https://www.wired.co.uk/gallery/futura-font-on-the-moon-christopher-burke-book
• https://fontmeme.com/famous-logos-created-with-futura-font/
• https://cei.org/blog/adobe-garamond-harry-potter-books-not-character-font
• https://www.myfonts.com/fonts/itc/franklin-gothic/
• https://study.com/academy/lesson/entasis-definition-architecture-architects.html
• https://study.com/academy/lesson/ogee-arches-definition-construction.html
• http://www.eyemagazine.com/feature/article/through-thick-and-think-fashion-and-type
• https://www.quora.com/Why-don%E2%80%99t-lowercase-and-uppercase-numbers-exist
• https://typographica.org/on-typography/microsofts-cleartype-font-collection-a-fair-and-balanced-review/
• https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/typography/cleartype/clear-type-font-collection
• In addition – Wikipedia pages for each font in the list were used

Elly Hughes

Managing consultant, related articles, mastering high-impact conference presentations.

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Conference presentations are really hard to get right compared to day-to-day presentations. How do you tackle bigger stages, bigger rooms, bigger audiences and higher stakes?

Insights from a presentation templates expert

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A PowerPoint template is the foundation on which polished and professional presentations are built. We interview BrightCarbon’s new Templates Lead, Gemma Leamy, and pick her brains on the ideal process for creating robust PowerPoint templates.

115 PowerPoint Christmas cards to download and share!

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It's Christmas! After a late night with too much eggnog and brandy snaps we set ourselves a challenge to see who could come up with the wildest PowerPoint Christmas card! So it's the day after the night before, and through blurry eyes we can reveal our efforts...

Thank you very much for sharing such useful information!

what is the font you used in the text above

We use GT Walsheim as our corporate font (web, print)(which one has to pay for), but because it’s not a Windows standard font we actually use Segoe UI in our presentations.

What is a Bold font we can use?

What is the name of font you use on this website for writing information ..I want this font

It’s GT Walsheim .

Wow that was good but maybe add Mali to the best fonts for google slides and docs

What is the font of the article?

See above in the comments… GT Walsheim

Loved it. Thanks a lot Bright Carbon team

What font did you write this article in?

See comments above – GT Walsheim, which is a paid font, and not great for presentations as it isn’t on many machines.

Thanks, this helped me with my school presentation!

Absolutely great thank you!

Join the BrightCarbon mailing list for monthly invites and resources

As we were novice and non-marketing professionals, everyone took the time to explain and teach while also doing, which came in handy to feel more comfortable with what we were creating. Marc Chaanine Jamaica Bearings

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Thesis / dissertation formatting manual (2024).

• Filing Fees and Student Status
• Submission Process Overview
• Electronic Thesis Submission
• Paper Thesis Submission
• Formatting Overview
• Fonts/Typeface
• Pagination, Margins, Spacing
• Paper Thesis Formatting
• Preliminary Pages Overview
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Selecting a font (typeface)

Be consistent in the use of font/typeface throughout your manuscript. All text material must be in the same font/typeface; all headings and figure/table titles/captions must be in a consistent typeface.

Please select a font, size, and color that are highly legible and will reproduce clearly. Ornate or decorative fonts such as script, calligraphy, gothic, italics, or specialized art fonts are not acceptable. For electronic submissions, embedded fonts are required.

Any symbols, equations, figures, drawings, diacritical marks, or lines that cannot be typed, and therefore are drawn, must be added in permanent black ink.

Below are suggested fonts and sizes.

Establish and follow a consistent pattern for layout of all headings.  All headings should use the same font size, font weight, typeface, etc.

For example: center all major headings; place secondary headings at least two lines below major headings.

Typeface/printing quality (paper submissions only)

If you are submitting your manuscript on paper, printer quality is critical to produce a clean, clear image. You are strongly urged to use a laser printer, as ink jet and line printers generally do not produce fully clear, legible results. Dot matrix-type printers are not acceptable.

• << Previous: Formatting Overview
• Next: Pagination, Margins, Spacing >>
• Last Updated: Aug 26, 2024 11:00 AM
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KU Thesis and Dissertation Formatting: Fonts and Spacing

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Office of Graduate Studies Thesis and Dissertation Formatting Guidelines

These rules are taken from the KU Office of Graduate Studies Thesis or Dissertation Formatting Guidelines. To see the full thesis or dissertation formatting requirements, visit https://graduate.ku.edu/submitting

• Students should use the same font size (11- or 12-point) and style (typically Times New Roman) through the thesis, including labels and references.
• Tables, captions, and footnotes should use the same font style but may be smaller in size (usually 10-point).
• Chapter and section headings may be bold and no more than 2 points larger than the text size.
• Non-standard typefaces, such as script, are generally not acceptable except for commonly used symbols.
• The Office of Graduate Studies recommends that students get their font choice approved by their department and their graduate division before the thesis defense.
• Lettering and symbols in tables and figures should be no less than 10 points.
• Normally theses and dissertations use double-spaced formatting.
• Single-spaced formatting is acceptable in the table of contents, footnotes, end notes, charts, graphs, tables, block quotations, captions, glossary, appendices and bibliography.
• Students may use singe- or one-and-a-half-spacing for the body of the text with prior written approval of their thesis committee and graduate division.

Subject Guide

• << Previous: Title and Acceptance Pages
• Next: Page Numbering >>
• Last Updated: May 9, 2024 9:48 AM
• URL: https://guides.lib.ku.edu/etd

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• Essay Editor

Thesis Format: Detailed Instructions and Tips

Gathering the necessary material for a large and saturated project is just half the battle, to set up everything and format the work properly is a real deed, challenging and exacting. There are a lot of specific requirements and rules to be born in mind. But don't take it so hard, we give you all the fundamental information concerning thesis paper format. You'll find out 

• what parts a successful work should have;
• what formatting requirements should be adhered to;
• what tips occur to be helpful.

So, get ready to remember all the important principles in terms of paper finalization.

What is a Thesis Format?

In the process of thesis creation, everyone should set up the data in a specific way. The general structure and stylistic patterns are usually the same everywhere, though some minor issues may vary from one department to another.

Correct Thesis Format: Important or Not?

When working with the material it is crucial to stick to the thesis writing format in order to:

• show your professional approach to this activity;
• refine the readability of the text;
• provide convenient navigation through the work;
• bring the skills nearer to the academic standards;
• help the audience focus on the investigation essence.

A Thesis and its Parts

The thesis structure format implies such parts, obligatory for a good consistent work.

Having discussed the standard structure of the paper, it's high time to discuss useful rules and tips on how to complete the processing.

A General Guideline for Thesis Formatting

Well, how to format a thesis correctly? The most important points are presented in the table.

These recommendations are general, and every writer must look through the local guidelines in all cases. Almost every department has a thesis format example, and by getting acquainted with it everyone is certain to get rid of potential mistakes. It doesn't take much time but accentuates your interest and thoroughness, so important for a perfect researcher.

Other Tips on how to Format the Thesis

Apart from answering the question 'What is the thesis format?', we'd like to present some additional recommendations and tips concerning the work. It is useful to remind that visual division helps to acquire information in a better way

• Use single-spaced blocks for quotations or footnotes.
• Add a special line for the committee signature on the relevant page.
• Organize margins from all the sides of the sheet appropriately.
• Check the numbers on page consequence.
• Proofread all the text and check all the format details before submitting the paper.

Studying general rules of formatting is crucial for students, researchers, and other specialists of the sphere. But every time you are also to look into the guidelines offered by your local headmen. The correct paperwork is pleasant to read. Moreover, it underlines the author's professionalism and preciseness.

If you need to get acquainted with thesis format essay, try Aithor . It is a professional instrument, generating texts according to input parameters. You may choose the language, writing style, topic, outline, and other necessary options.

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