WHAT IS YORK'S FAVORITE FONT

Written by Aarya Armogan, 10/19/2026.

What is York’s Favorite Font?

I got York students and teachers to answer which of the above fonts is their favorite. Using the pangram ‘the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog’ they are shown every letter of the alphabet in the given font. But, before we talk about which font is York's favorite, let's do a quick history of fonts.

Typography begins circa 1440, when Johannes Gutenberg invented movable type, using a handwritten style known as Blackletter (Fig. 1). As printing spread across Europe, Italian craftspeople (generally Roman) used stone inscriptions for inspiration, creating serif fonts like Garamond that were much easier to read in books.

Figure 1: Wikipedia contributors. "Blackletter." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 13 Oct. 2026. Web. 13 Oct. 2026.

During the 1700s and 1800s, better printing techniques allowed for the creation of contrast serif fonts like Baskerville (Fig. 2) and Bodoni (11pt). The Industrial Revolution created the need for large bold advertising signs, leading to slab serifs and the very first sans-serif fonts which, fun fact, were mocked as "grotesque" for dropping the serifs.

Figure 2.: Wikipedia contributors. "Baskerville." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 30 Sep. 2026. Web. 13 Oct. 2026.

In the 20th century, modern design embraced clean forms like, and , which became the world’s most popular typefaces for logos and signage. With the rise of computers and the internet, fonts evolved into code, which lead to the rise of and the likes.

Now that that is over, we can look at the different fonts that the participants were shown:

Coming in first place by a mile was Font 6, with 75% of participants believing it to be the best of the six. In second Font 5 at 15%, third being Font 3 at 7%, and last being Font 1 with 3% believing it to be the best font.

Now, which font is which?

So, now we know, York’s preferred font is Playfair Display, which I must say is quite nice. But why?

I will assume that when Playfair Display is in 11pt it appears larger than the other fonts, and with the pretty letters, what's not to love?

Now the question is, what font am I writing this article in? I bet you will never guess…

To get a hint highlight the text below:
Hint: Think about the browser that you are using…

To find out the answer, highlight the text below:

Answer: Google Sans

Fun Fact (Sorry Brooklyn for stealing the idea): Times New Roman became the academic standard in 1932 when it was designed for Britain's ‘The Times’ newspaper to be compact and easy to read. It was made even more popular when personal computers became abundant in the 1990s and Microsoft Word made it the default font for blank documents.

Aarya :)

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