![]() When used less as a tool for reading and more for emphasis, narrow letters can provide impact and an element of sophistication. Note that few words are used in the condensed typeface and it is not used for the main copy on either site.Ī narrow typeface also can make a great art element. ![]() This site and Designing Monsters featured above, for example, use a condensed typeface for headlines and headers. ![]() A few places where condensed fonts workĪlthough condensed fonts can be difficult to use effectively, they can work for certain elements of design.Ī condensed font can add a lot of pop as a banner or when used with a few words in headers. The resulting effect can be jarring or force you to diverge from your overall color palette. Colors can take on a hue of their own and bleed from surrounding colors, appearing different in the type than in other elements on the page, such as colored boxes or images. The contrast can even cause letters to blur when reading blocks of text or scrolling through multiple lines.Ĭondensed fonts also cause problems when it comes to color, especially in condensed fonts with thin strokes. The contrast between dark and light can be difficult to read when working with closely spaced letters and thin line strokes. Many sites with scrolling text use black text on a white (or light colored) background. A super-thin font next to a wide typeface can be jarring to read and can make a thin font appear even more condensed than it is.Īlso think about the color scheme of your site. Narrow fonts can also be hard to pair with other typefaces if not done carefully. Sites that have large blocks of text and rely on text blocks should not use a condensed font as the primary typeface because readability will be a concern. Back to that packed train, letters and line spacing are tight thus making blocks of text intimidating to look at and even harder to comprehend. Why condensed fonts should be avoidedĪs a general rule, condensed fonts do not lend themselves to readability. Used sparingly and for large type, such as a header, condensed fonts can be quite effective design tools. Some narrower fonts may have a more modern or funky feel to them and might serve as a complementary design element. Letters will be taller but the difference between 10 and 12 points for a condensed font does not dramatically increase readability.Ĭondensed fonts also have a look and style of their own. Depending on the typeface, up to twice as much copy can be put in the same space using a narrower typeface.ĭesigners can also use a larger point size when working with condensed fonts but the larger size can be misleading. The primary reason many people choose a condensed font is to save space. Some common condensed fonts include Bernard Condensed, Franklin Gothic Demi Condensed, Gill Sans Condensed and Liberation Sans Narrow. Often such fonts may have the words “condensed,” “narrow” or “compressed” in their names, although some fonts use numbers to represent character widths. The term condensed font can also apply to fonts where each variation is much taller than it is wide. The letters of a condensed font have set-widths that are narrower than in the standard typeface from the same family. Although there are a wide-range of excuses to use them there is a simple reason why you should not: Condensed fonts can be very hard to read. (And that’s why you don’t see them all that commonly used.)Ĭondensed variations of most fonts should be used sparingly or avoided altogether in most design projects with blocks of text. But that’s the same feeling you get when using a family of condensed or ultra-thin fonts on your website. ![]() No one likes that too tight feeling of riding the metro or train with too many people at once. From our sponsor: Deploy Now automates builds and deployment, letting you focus on your code.
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