4 ms·

I don't think high-DPI screens are as commonplace as it is continuously being repeated here. The only relatively common high-DPI screens are on the macbooks and

I don't think high-DPI screens are as commonplace as it is continuously being repeated here. The only relatively common high-DPI screens are on the macbooks and higher end 13/14" laptops (250-300 ppi). If you move away from laptops and on desktop-sized screens (25-27") ppi quickly plummets. A common market monitor size/resolution combination is 27" at 4k resolution. This is roughly 160 ppi, although better than 1080p ~100 ppi screens is still nowhere near the pixel density of a macbook. So even on 4k screens the legibility of a heavily-serifed font such as Garamond is questioned. There is probably ONE desktop monitor with >250 ppi I can readily find* (Dell UP3218K) and that's almost $4k !! I'd say the author's argument still stands for anyone not on a ~$≥1.5k laptop. It's the same story as "we don't need subpixel antialiasing any more". Yes it's an ugly hack and yes you definitely don't need it on 300 ppi screen. Fonts are still going to look fuzzy on anything else. [*] In the UK: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#r=768004320,576002160,512002880,512002160,512001440,409602160,384002160&sort=price&page=1 https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#r=768004320,57...

marvindanig 5y ago
You're limiting the scope of ppi to desktops only? Almost ~80% of the web is on mobile [1][2][3]. Close to 56% people online are "mobile only", which means that they will never look at anything other than a hdpi screen in their lifetime. [1] https://hostingtribunal.com/blog/mobile-percentage-of-traffic/ https://hostingtribunal.com/blog/mobile-percentage-of-traffi... [2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/277125/share-of-website-traffic-coming-from-mobile-devices/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/277125/share-of-website-... [3] https://www.smartinsights.com/mobile-marketing/mobile-marketing-analytics/mobile-marketing-statistics/ https://www.smartinsights.com/mobile-marketing/mobile-market...
- spystath 5y ago
  It's true, I haven't factored in smartphones. That still doesn't invalidate the argument. I still believe it's quite narrow-minded to choose typefaces based on a 270+ ppi device. It still excludes a quite significant amount of users, and probably most desktop users.
  - marvindanig 5y ago
    > It still excludes a quite significant amount of users, and probably most desktop users. A shrinking fraction of 32% [1] web users. Some hard data to take a call based off of. [1] https://twitter.com/jaffathecake/status/1397884753097990144 https://twitter.com/jaffathecake/status/1397884753097990144
leephillips 5y ago
... or on my 2013 Google Chromebook Pixel, 240 ppi. You can sometimes find them for about $200 on Amazon. On a larger external monitor, I’m not sure you should directly compare the resolution, because you view them from a longer distance. So a smaller resolution would be optically equivalent to a higher resolution on a laptop. This is the reason you need even higher resolutions on phones, as we view them from even shorter distances.
HPsquared 5y ago
Large displays are usually further away than laptop screens, in fact that's the main benefit of them - you can have a lot of clear desk space.

marvindanig 5y ago

You're limiting the scope of ppi to desktops only? Almost ~80% of the web is on mobile [1][2][3]. Close to 56% people online are "mobile only", which means that they will never look at anything other than a hdpi screen in their lifetime. [1] https://hostingtribunal.com/blog/mobile-percentage-of-traffic/ https://hostingtribunal.com/blog/mobile-percentage-of-traffi... [2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/277125/share-of-website-traffic-coming-from-mobile-devices/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/277125/share-of-website-... [3] https://www.smartinsights.com/mobile-marketing/mobile-marketing-analytics/mobile-marketing-statistics/ https://www.smartinsights.com/mobile-marketing/mobile-market...

spystath 5y ago
It's true, I haven't factored in smartphones. That still doesn't invalidate the argument. I still believe it's quite narrow-minded to choose typefaces based on a 270+ ppi device. It still excludes a quite significant amount of users, and probably most desktop users.
- marvindanig 5y ago
  > It still excludes a quite significant amount of users, and probably most desktop users. A shrinking fraction of 32% [1] web users. Some hard data to take a call based off of. [1] https://twitter.com/jaffathecake/status/1397884753097990144 https://twitter.com/jaffathecake/status/1397884753097990144

leephillips 5y ago

... or on my 2013 Google Chromebook Pixel, 240 ppi. You can sometimes find them for about $200 on Amazon. On a larger external monitor, I’m not sure you should directly compare the resolution, because you view them from a longer distance. So a smaller resolution would be optically equivalent to a higher resolution on a laptop. This is the reason you need even higher resolutions on phones, as we view them from even shorter distances.

HPsquared 5y ago

Large displays are usually further away than laptop screens, in fact that's the main benefit of them - you can have a lot of clear desk space.