Calibri has been the default font for Office for 15 years. In 2021, Microsoft announced the commission of 5 new candidate sources to fill the position of Calibri. Bierstadt, Grandview, Seaford, Skeena and Tenorite appeared discreetly in the font menu of the Office applications of 1.2 billion users. In July 2023, Microsoft announced the name of the winner.
The name
To everyone's surprise, that name was not among the 5 candidates. However, it is one of them renamed for international audiences. Thus, Bierstadt was renamed Aptos and in February 2024 its service began towards the next decade.
Financial typography
At Sigma Rocket, we welcome Aptos with open arms. From the point of view of graphic design applied to the financial world, it elegantly meets a fundamental requirement: the space between numbers should never be proportional to their width. Otherwise, numbers containing one or more ones may seem smaller in comparison, especially when presented stacked in a table. Traditionally, this need was solved with the use of mono-space fonts. These present each number as a block, all of the same size, as in bank cards (the only example that can still be considered contemporary, perhaps for a short time).
The evolution of graphic reproduction media ushered in a renaissance in the art of typography. For the typographer, one of the main benefits of the digital world is the flexibility that can be given to a set of characters to accommodate each other. For example, a capital T, with all its abundant and useless real estate, can accommodate the exuberance of a capital O. As a result, the text as a whole is more fluid and easier to read. However, this presents a problem for the layout of tables and graphs with numbers, since a figure with a lower value than another can take up more space than this one. Therefore, for a typeface to meet the basic requirement of graphic design applied to the financial world, it must include tabulated numbers, that is, with spaces that are not proportional.
It is fair to mention that Calibri also met this requirement. If there is apprehension about it, the reason lies in a graphic attribute that affects not only their numbers, but also letters and signs, as explained below.
Corporate typography
It's easy to underestimate the importance of a “default font”. Many graphic design professionals don't consider it relevant because they believe that a professional should never use a default font. The irony is that it is usually an opinion by default, formulated from an ideal without computing the reality of everyday life. It is the mentality that results in the production of brand books that include requirements that most of a company's employees cannot meet. As a graphic designer, I know the effect Echo Chamber which occurs in creative teams when contact with the everyday reality of the rest of the world is lost. The reality is that for the vast majority of people who work in a company, the correct use of corporate typography is not on their list of priorities. Otherwise, it would paint a dark landscape for the company in question. Add to that other reasons, justifiable or not, why the rules for the use of corporate typography will not be complied with: incompatibility with devices, disinterest or lack of technical knowledge, strict licensing of commercial sources that make it difficult to work with external collaborators, etc.). This illustrates the context in which we analyze the arrival and the possible impact of Aptos.
In that context, Calibri was a problematic source. It's interesting to see why, since it exemplifies both the do & don't's of a default font and the surprising evolution of Microsoft over the past 15 years. In this example, Calibri is that friend who wants to adapt to the personality of each person with whom he interacts. Except that in this example, that friend has a unique and unmistakable personality. Calibri is round and square at the same time. The drawback is that precisely this trait defines the anatomy of this source and makes it easily recognizable.
We can approach it as a tragicomic visual allegory: Calibri's rounded corners represent the danger of applying the customer's aspiration to the anatomy of the product: “we want a font that everyone likes”. On the contrary, Aptos faces the adaptation game with a different philosophy: discretion. It lacks radically characteristic features that allow the general public to differentiate it from other similar typefaces at first glance. Achieving a balance between this apparent absence of details and a visually appealing look is one of the challenges that the creator of Aptos, Steve Matteson, has successfully faced. In turn, Microsoft has faced the challenge of choosing the typeface that will define the appearance and legibility of an incalculable number of documents for perhaps the next 15 years.
The 4 finalists
The other 4 finalist fonts are still available to Office users. Among them, Grandview deserves a mention, inspired by the classic typography of German road signs. Good choice in terms of its readability rather than being well proven. However, the knowledgeable reader will have already noticed the drawback: Grandview looks like a clone of the DIN font family. The infamous story of the Arial font as a replacement for the iconic Helvetica weighs on Microsoft's shoulders. The company seems to have learned from its mistake.
To pull the thread:
A change of typeface: Microsoft's new default font has arrived
Finding the best free fonts for numbers
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Juan José Ros
Founding partner of Sigma Rocket
