What's a good space-saving font?

Helvetica is good.

Arial or Tahoma. Both a very square and straight forward. So if they were small, they would probably be easy to read.

Times New Roman

(Helvetica is a display font, and Ariel is Helvetica)

@pdworkin The Little Mermaid is a font?

@pdworkin Blasphemy!! http://www.swiss-miss.com/2009/09/arial-versus-helvetica.html

Gil Sans MT is a good one, although a little squat. It along with most other Sans fonts accepts a fair bit of “squeezing” or narrowing.

Bell Centennial (not free, sorry) is readable in very small type, particularly the numbers.

There are several ways to answer this question because it depends on exactly what the application is.

Two fonts introduced with Microsoft Office 2007 are Calibri and Corbel. Both of those work well in small size.

Also, you can consider looking for the “narrow” or “condensed” variants of your favorite font.

And finally, if you wanted a bold and narrow font for titling purposes, you might consider Impact.

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There are literally tens of thousands of different typefaces available. Keep an eye out for additional suggestions, too.

@grumpyfish Cool!

@pdworkin: typography trolling?

arial narrow is a huge space saver but can be very difficult to read at times

Sevenet – max 7×7 pixels.

http://www.searchfreefonts.com/free/sevenet-7.htm

You may need to provide a magnifying glass to your GPs.

braille

[ tangential ]

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Curious, @pdworkin… why do you say Helvetica is a “display font”? Are you suggesting it was designed for the computer screen specifically, like Arial?

Helvetica was originally created back in 1958 before most computer font technology had been invented. And its primary use for much of that time is in physical print.

If you want to go really small, then the Bee’s Knees font might suit the bill. At just 3px in size and rely on sub-pixel rendering, it’s about as small as you can go.

@robmandu “Display Fonts”, in that context, refer to fonts intended for posters, headings, placards and other “large” displays.

E.g., on this site: http://www.donblack.ca/Monotype/

I would edit down your newsletter or add a page before using tiny or narrow text.

Good on you for thinking ahead about readability for older folks. I would not go below 12 point text.

The common convention for readability is a serif font (like Times) for the body of your text, and a sans-serif (like Arial and Helvetica) for the headings.

@robmandu I like it. /agree

@robmandu A man who knows fonts! Be still my heart! I agree with your answers. You know your stuff.

My top vote: Microsoft Himalaya for space saving and legibility.

Also, French Script MT is not bad for space, but not quite as legible

I came here looking for an answer to the question posed, but was dissatisfied with the suggestions provided, for my purposes. I’m putting recipes onto 5×8“cards, and need both legibility and a good use of space.

I hope this helps you.
MS-Win 10, MS Word 2010