How To Ensure Your Fonts Are Print-Ready? Essential Font Printing Tips From Digital To Print

Print-ready fonts are typeface variations that are as easy and joyful to read on paper as on screen. When designers look for the right font combinations for any design, they seek to find something that looks good, reads well, and has the right style and personality to suit the product’s audience.

Georgia vs. Courier Fonts

Georgia, for example, has a unique vibe compared to Courier New, even though both are variations of serif font types and attribute a traditional and timeless quality to a design piece.

So, when searching for the best fonts for print, what are the hints to keep your eyes on? What font combination best practices must you follow?

Font vs. typeface

Before we begin, here is some language clarification:

Although most people use the terms font and typeface interchangeably, font denotes a specific variation or style within a particular typeface. In contrast, a typeface is an overarching family of related character styles.

Typeface vs. Fonts – The difference

For example, Arial is a typeface, whereas Arial Bold is a font. This guide will follow the general practice of switching between fonts to keep things flowing.

5 Types of fonts

Fonts come in five distinct typographical styles: serif, sans-serif, slab, script, and display.

Below is their brief introduction.

Serif Fonts – Aloha Magazine, Garamond, Butler, Cinzel, Arsenica, Bogart, Mirage, and Edition

• Serif: Serif fonts are known for their decorative flicks, tails, and mounds at the end of their strokes. These details make serifs the most print-friendly fonts in the world because they significantly improve the legibility and readability of any text. Since serif fonts are the oldest fonts in the world (first designed in the 15th century), they are considered the most traditional, stable, timeless, and trustworthy.

Sans Serif Fonts – Lemon Milk, Roboto, Caviar Dreams, Tommy, Built Titling, Quicksand, Kenyan, and Louise George Cafe

• Sans Serif: Sans-serif fonts have no serifs, hence the word ‘sans’ in the name (it’s French for ‘without’). They are the most versatile fonts with wide-ranging applications. They have a modern aesthetic that is effortless and stylish. You can put them on paper, screen, or plastic; they’ll look good everywhere.

Slab Serif Fonts: Varsity Team, Ferro Rosso, Octin Sports, Bullpen, Marlboro, Graduate, Staubach, and Bevan

• Slab: Slab fonts have thicker bodies, broad, uniform strokes, and an overall weighty appearance. They have serifs at their stroke ends, but unlike traditional serif fonts, their strokes follow a consistent thickness and thus have a slab-like appearance. Slab fonts are mostly used for logo design, headlines, and title typography. There are better fonts for small print.

Script Fonts – Cream Cake, Brother Royal, Roadstone, Quick Chick, Hunters, Signatra, Blacker Script, and Bellena

• Script: Script fonts mimic handwriting and are highly favored for their personalized feel. While they aren’t based on actual handwriting, the effect often carries and gives them an advantage. Script fonts aren’t your best print-ready fonts, so if you decide to use them, be extra careful with legibility and readability.

Display Fonts – Super Sunday, Gello Funky, Peach Lotus, Inlanders, Play Pretend, Robot Crush, SquareFont, and Nau Ser

• Display: Also called decorative fonts, these fancy print fonts are ideally suited to large, titular spaces. Think of logo design on packaging, a book cover, or a research paper header. They are often considered the larger-than-life version of other font types and you’ll find display font variations in script, serif, and sans-serif fonts.

When choosing modern print fonts, look for the best variations in small print sizes, large headings, and title spaces.

Why must we ensure a font’s print-ready status?

Ensure print-ready fonts to maintain text readability

• Text Readability: Fonts that need to be adequately prepared for print can result in blurry, pixelated, or distorted text.

Use print-friendly fonts for design consistency

• Design Consistency: Fonts may look different on screen compared to print due to variations in resolution and color rendering.

Poor-quality printing can harm your brand personality

• Brand Personality: Inconsistent or poor-quality printing can damage your brand’s image.

Instable fonts can lead to design changes

• Font Stability: If a font isn’t embedded or properly set up, printers might substitute it with a different font, leading to unexpected changes in your design.

Use print-ready fonts to preserve visual aesthetics

• Visual Aesthetic: Bring a font’s print-ready status to preserve your design’s visual aesthetics, maintaining the intended look and feel.

Ensure accurate color reproduction with print-ready fonts

• Color Accuracy: Print-ready fonts ensure accurate color reproduction on paper, preventing color shifts or mismatched hues during printing.

Follow licensing agreements for print-ready fonts

• Licensing Compliance: Some fonts have specific licensing agreements that restrict their use in print unless they are properly licensed.

Use print-ready fonts for printing system compatibility

• File Compatibility: Ensuring a font’s print-ready status guarantees compatibility with various printing systems.

16 Things that ensure your fonts are print-ready

Now that we’re done with the pre-design work of knowing and recognizing fonts, how do we select the most print-friendly fonts?

Font Size Considerations

Pay close attention to the font size. It is the most important feature when it comes to ensuring your audience can read what you have painstakingly designed and created.

1. Keep the font size between 10 and 11 points.

Font point size – Serif and Sans Serif fonts

Anything less than 7 points is a criminal act where you’re forcing people to read what they can’t see. While 12 points may be the standard in most word processing programs, it can be a large print font size and cause reading flow interruptions.

So keep your print fonts in the sweet spot of 10-11 points and enjoy your audience benefitting from what you’ve created.

2. Don’t judge a font size on a screen.

Font pixels on different screens

Insist on seeing your print fonts on actual printed proofs instead of relying on the screen design alone. Screen zoom, resolution, and size can always influence how a font looks on screen and how it ends up on paper.

As any experienced designer can tell you, screen-to-print design is an art. Several details unique to each platform must be kept to ensure the design looks consistent and cohesive when moving from one medium to another.

3. Consider your audience.

Does your audience wear reading glasses? If so, the correct font size for your marketing design may differ from the standard 10 to 11-point we’d discussed.

As always, consult your audience before finalizing any design details. Let their potential reactions and engagement rates be the best judges of your final design decisions.

4. Verify compliance with any font size regulations.

Compliance Requirement for Print Font

Font size regulations exist for printed materials like packaging labels, legal documents, and disclosure text. The FDA, for example, requires that all food and drug labels be in the 8-point size to ensure legibility for consumers.

5. Check the font size across all marketing materials.

Your ideal font size will also vary according to the specific marketing material it’s in. For example, the font size on a logo tagline may differ from the one on the brochure. So, you will require print proofs of all your marketing materials to ensure the font size is perfect for all items.

Font Style Considerations

Font style refers to how the fonts you have chosen look and feel. Variations in style can make a font look chirpy, fun, stylish, and authoritative. The tips below ensure your screen print fonts vibe with your brand when presented on paper.

6. Consider your print matter’s genre.

Your brand’s print matter can range from a logo design on packaging labels to picture captions on the company’s annual report. The genres will ensure the best type of print fonts for the design.

To give yourself enough variety, mix and match fonts so you always have access to the right style for the moment’s need.

7. Pay attention to kerning and leading.

A fit-for-print font carries enough spacing between individual characters and lines so that people can discern character differences and the text is easier to read. All font styles carry a default leading and kerning rate. Find out what they are for your selected fonts.

8. Ensure legibility at smaller sizes.

Does your chosen font style shrink beyond comprehension when you pick a size too small? How will that work when you need the best font for small print?

Answer these questions by ordering a print proof of your design that encompasses all font sizes, styles, and applications to ensure no mistakes make it to the final file.

9. Stick with 1-2 font families.

Don’t shop around too much when selecting print-ready fonts. Font variations from several typeface families will give you sufficient variety without sacrificing cohesion and consistency.

10. Leave enough white space.

The purpose of selecting print-ready fonts is to facilitate reading and comprehension. Leaving enough white space within and around the text ensures it’s easy to read and understand. White space also makes the design look clean and invites more engagement with it.

Font Color Considerations

Color will play a significant role in ensuring your fonts are ready for print. If the contrast is poor and the fonts aren’t legible, the size and style alone won’t save your design. So what are the color considerations to be mindful of when choosing your fonts for print?

11. Choose a CMYK color palette.

Colors manifest differently when you go from screen to print. To ensure a consistent look and feel of your design across all media, you have to design your print materials in the CMYK color mode.

This mode follows the way ink interacts with paper and uses the same methodology for print-design materials.

12. Pick less than 3 colors for your fonts.

While both colors and fonts are two critical components of branding, use them sparingly in design. With lots of meticulous care and consideration. When choosing colors for fonts that will be read, go with the classic black-on-white.

It offers the best background contrast and hence the most readability.

13. Considered background contrast.

If black on white isn’t an option, use accessible design guidelines to find colors that give you the most complementary contrast for reading. Color Safe is a great tool to gain access to thousands of accessible and beautiful color palettes for a range of color deficiency concerns.

Some Extra Font Considerations

Done with major print font considerations, the extras below help you go the extra mile. Use them to create a truly print-ready design, with perfect fonts and everything!

14. Choose an ink-efficient font.

Impress your eco-friendly clients, score points with your audience, and show some necessary love to the planet by using ink-efficient fonts. These fonts use the least bit of ink and toner during printing and, hence have a low carbon footprint. Toner Buzz did a fun piece on ink-efficient fonts last year. Go check it out before you finalize anything.

15. Consider the paper quality.

For those who think paper’s not a big deal for modern, digital brands, I’ve got news for you, my sweet summer child.

If you have physical business cards, brochures, company letterheads, envelopes, branded merchandise, product packaging, packaging labels, and the rest of the hoopla that comes with marketing and selling, you need a paper-friendly font.

And for that, you must consider the quality of your paper. Fonts print differently from one print surface to another. Verdana on embossed printing will be very different from Verdana on a simple white A4.

To ensure your fonts look super-friendly on any surface they are, choose your fonts carefully and print-proof them on any type of paper you might need.

16. Do the squint test!

What’s the squint test, you ask?

It’s a fun quick test to make sure everyone can see your design, whether or not they have the perfect 20/20 vision. Do the test by squinting at your design or stepping back 4 feet to see if you can still make out the words.

If you can, congratulations! Your design passes the all-important squint test. If not, get back to work, lazy!

10 Best Fonts for Print

What is the best print-ready font for a creative wordmark logo? Or an alphabet logo?

Everything you are designing will go into print at one time or another. So arm yourself with the right fonts from the word go. Below is a quick list of 10 fonts — five each from the serif and sans-serif type — that are perfect print-style fonts.

Serif fonts for print

Most of these are traditional serif fonts but offer a great mix of sleek, traditional, and modern aesthetics. Take a look.

• Baskerville
• Bodini
• Courier New
• Garamond
• Times New Roman

Sans-serif fonts for print

These are the best sans-serif fonts for print and you can use them on everything from a logo design to the small print on a product label.

• Verdana
• Helvetica
• Avant Garde (headline font)
• Franklin Gothic
• Gill Sans

Conclusion

Of all the brand identity assets that need your special focus when taking a design from screen to print, fonts are the most critical.

Style, character, and aesthetics are only one side of the coin. You also need them for more functional purposes, such as reading, comprehension, and awareness. So, walk the perfect line between looks and substance when choosing your print fonts.

We hope this guide has made that process easier for you and you are now equipped with the specific knowledge on how to optimize your font selection for all future projects.

If you are looking for more in-depth design knowledge, we have done a ton of work on design basics. Check out our guide on color psychology, this post on types of logo design, and a fun piece on what makes the Playboy logo so iconic.