How to set your browser to enlarge tiny type

by "Peterre"

 

Those with poor eyesight or very high resolution monitors may meet Web pages with text that is too small to read.

All browsers that I have ever used offer a way of avoiding that problem.

Some people prefer to change the screen resolution rather than change the browser settings, or they do both. Changing the screen resolution is discussed near the bottom of this page.

Tiny Type - the quick fix

If it is only an occasional page that has the tiny type, use one of the quick fix methods.

All browsers offer a quick fix method of changing the text size.

e.g in Firefox, use ctrl with '+' or "=" to enlarge text, or crtl with '-' to shrink it. Opera has an excellent zoom facility.

Be aware that the quick fix methods are not permanent, i.e. if you leave the browser then return to it, your settings will have gone.

Tiny Type - the permanent solution

I have given up providing detailed advice about making permanent changes to minimum font size, default fonts and default font sizes. There are so many browsers and each has several versions. Internet Explorer is particularly quirky.

The help file of your browser will assist you.

Many browsers allow you to set a minimum font size. No matter how tiny is the text on the Web page, the browser will automatically enlarge it if necessary to the minimum size that you have set.

To help you to make the appropriate settings, the following poem is displayed in tiny type, specified in four different ways.

 

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

 

In case you wonder, "default font size" does not mean the size of the default font. It means the size that is used by default for all fonts in cases where the web page does not specify a size. That is, it is the default 'font size', not the 'default font' size.

To help choose the correct size(s), the following poem is displayed with font face and font size being specified in several ways that are commonly used on Web pages.

 

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

 

Choose a setting such that any of them would be acceptable to you for the reading of ordinary paragraph text.

It will almost certainly be impossible for you to get them all to be of the same size. Some compromise may be necessary.

If one of the poems remains stubbornly small even at a setting that makes another poem too large, increase the minimum font size until the smallest poem has the smallest acceptable size for paragraph text, then reduce the default size setting until the largest poem is not too large.

Setting the default fonts

If a browser does not have the font that the Web page specifies, then it uses one of the default fonts. In most browsers, there is more than one default font that can be set.

To help with the choice, the following poem is displayed in the default font(s). Choose font(s) that appear attractive in the poem. Ensure that your choice does not cause the row of Os below the poem to be displayed with jagged outlines.

Before setting the default fonts, set the default font sizes as described in the previous section.

 

default
 
Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

O O O O O O O O O O O

monospace
 
Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

O O O O O O O O O O O

serif
 
Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

O O O O O O O O O O O

sans-serif
 
Mary had a little lamb,
its feet as black as soot.
And everywhere that Mary went,
his sooty foot he put.

O O O O O O O O O O O

 

Changing the screen resolution

Decreasing the resolution will increase the size of all text and objects on your screen, not just in the browser but in all programs, and also on the desktop.

For example, if your screen resolution is set to 1024 x 768, you could decrease it to 800 x 600 although with the latter you may find that some Web sites will require horizontal scrolling.

Having changed the screen resolution, it is advisable to reset the minimum font size etc.

The help facility of your operating system (e.g Windows XP or Windows 7) will almost certainly explain how to change the screen resolution.

If there are people with good vision who use your computer, they may prefer that the computer remains set at the higher screen resolution.

Comparison of browsers

For the Mac, there are probably good browsers that I don't know about, e.g. I have heard that Camino is modern and is therefore likely to have good user control of fonts and sizes. But since I do not have a Mac, I have no experience of it.

Internet Explorer for the Mac is a quite different browser from Internet Explorer for Windows despite having the same name. It is not modern. Again, I have no experience of it.

Contact

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you encounter problems with any of the above.

Email: paperclip444 at peterre dot demon dot co dot uk
(email address deliberately obfuscated to deter address collection by spammers).

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Copyright © 2012 by Peterre. All rights reserved.