Overview

Thoughtful selection of typefaces, appropriate font sizes, clear presentation of dates and times, and the proper use of abbreviations are key strategies for creating a digital world where information is accessible to everyone.

Video

Select here for the Fonts, Spacing, Dates/Times video transcript.

[Music]

[Kevin Bowersox-Johnson]

Hello, everyone, and welcome to this week's Accessibility Bite.

Today, we're diving into fonts, language, date/time formatting, and more. Making digital content accessible is a key part of inclusive communication. Whether you're creating documents, presentations, emails, or Canvas content, small choices like font selection, spacing, and date formatting can make a big impact.

In this short video, we'll cover essential accessibility best practices that ensure your content is readable and inclusive for all users, including those with visual impairments, cognitive disabilities, and screen reader users.

By the end of this session, you'll know the recommended types of fonts and font sizes to use when creating content, the importance of line spacing, how to format dates and times properly, and suggestions for your writing style.

Let's get started.

Let's start with fonts. The best practice is to use simple sans serif fonts like Aptos, Arial, or Verdana. Avoid decorative or script fonts as they can be difficult to read, especially for users with dyslexia or visual impairments.

Serif fonts can often cause a visual effect that makes multiple letters next to each other look like a different letter or garbled. For example, when the letters "r" and "n" are next to one another, some serif fonts can make them look like the letter "m" in the word "intern"—for example, making it look like "item."

Font size is also critical. A minimum of 12-point font is recommended for body text within documents and emails, but 14-point is even better for accessibility. For presentations, aim for at least 24-point to maintain readability.

Let's move to talking about how you should use space in your documents. Avoid walls of text by using at least a 1.15 line spacing and generous paragraph breaks. Proper spacing helps readers track text more easily, improving comprehension and reducing eye strain. Break up content with clear headings and bullet points.

As we discussed in a previous Byte video, screen readers use headings to navigate documents, so make sure to use heading styles instead of just bolding text.

Formatting dates and times correctly helps all users, including those using assistive technology. When writing out dates and times, you should write out dates in a full format, like March 15th, 2025. Avoid abbreviating days and months as screen readers may mispronounce shortened forms.

Include "AM" or "PM" for clarification when using the 12-hour format. Use only "AM" or "PM" once at the end when it applies to all times listed. For example, "The meeting is from 2:30 until 3:30 PM."

Avoid dashes, as screen readers often ignore them. Spell out words that describe the meaning instead. For example, "The meeting is from 2:30 until 3:30 PM"

Another key to accessibility is using simple, clear language. Some best practices for writing in plain language include:

Using common words and phrases instead of technical terms.
Using active voice whenever possible.
Keeping sentences short and to the point.
Avoiding unnecessary jargon.
Defining unfamiliar terms when you need to use them.
Spelling out abbreviations and acronyms the first time they are used.

Remember, the goal of learning these strategies is to make your content easy to understand the first time someone reads it.

Now, let's take a quick look at how to apply these accessibility best practices in a document.

Hello and welcome to another Bytes presentation. In today's presentation, we're going to talk about fonts, font sizes, and abbreviations when creating documents.

For today's purposes, we're going to use this document that I have on my screen as our example. Now, when I look at this document, the first thing that I notice is the font that's being used. If we highlight any font, or any word or paragraph or sentence, we can see the font that's being used. And here we're using Times New Roman.

Times New Roman is a serif font. Serif fonts are the fonts that have the little flags connected to each letter. The concern about serif fonts is that sometimes when letters are connected to each other or paired next to each other, they can look like a different letter, which can change the meaning of the word for somebody reading it. For example, these two letters—"r" and "n"—next to each other can look like an "m." Here are some examples of words that have "r" and "n" next to each other, and when changed to an "m" because of how it's perceived, it changes the complete word and the meaning that it's trying to convey.

So, we're going to start by highlighting all the text on this page. I'm using a Mac, so I'm going to do Command + A. If you're using a Windows machine, you would do Control + A. And I'm simply going to choose a sans serif font. I'm going to choose Aptos. So here we are with a sans serif font, and it's a little bit more readable.

The next thing that I notice is the second line of the document. It provides the date and time of this workshop. In this line, we have a lot of abbreviations. We have "a.m." and "a.m." again, and a dash to indicate from and to, so "from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m."

So let's break these down one at a time and start with days of the week. Whenever we use abbreviations like this, we're not guaranteed that a screen reader will actually pick up the full word. It will not necessarily say "Friday"—it might say "Fri." Same with months of the year.

Secondly, when we come here and look at the time: first of all, we don't need "a.m." after each time frame if they are of the same time frame. Because these are both in the a.m., we can actually delete the first "a.m."

Next, when we have "am" without periods, the screen reader might actually read that as the word "am." So instead of saying "10 a.m.," it would say "10 am."

Finally, the dash here—the symbol in the middle—is ignored by screen readers. So whenever we talk about dates, we want to actually write the word that we are meaning as that dash. In this case, we mean "10 a.m. to 11 a.m."

So finally, we're going to talk about these final zeros. If it starts at the top of the hour, we can actually delete those. And we can do the same at the end of the hour. Or, let's say it ends at 11:30. Then we can add the colon and the rest of the time. Otherwise, we can simply click the ten without adding the colon zero zero.

So let's hear what some of this sounds like with the screen reader.

Let's start with abbreviations. I'm going to first have the screen reader read the differences in the months of the year.

Here we go—3, 2, 1.

Here are the different months of the year abbreviated: Jan, February, Mar, Apr, May, June, Jul, August, September, October, November, and Dec. Spelled out: January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, and December.

Notice that the month of the year wasn't always noted when it was written as an abbreviation. So it's always best to spell out the month of the year completely.

Next, let's listen to days of the week. 3, 2, 1.

Hear the difference? Days of the week abbreviated: Mon, Tuesday, Wed, Thursday, Friday, Sat, and Sun. Spelled out: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

Again, notice that some days of the week, when abbreviated, were recognized and some it was not. So it's always best to be cautious and spell out the day of the week.

Now finally, the third thing we're going to hear is what happens when we use symbols between times. The first thing you're going to hear is the version with symbols. Then it’s going to read what happens when we change those symbols.

3, 2, 1.

Hear the difference between times using dashes: "Our class meets from 10 10:50 a.m. Monday–Thursday." Using words between times: "Our class meets from 10 to 10:50 a.m., Monday through Thursday."

Notice again: once we changed the symbol to words, the screen reader was able to be much more accurate and less confusing for the user.

Moving on down this document, the next thing that I notice is some spacing concerns. For example, you'll notice that there are no spaces between this colon and the list.

We want to have some spacing, and it is best to do that. We can just highlight, and I like to go to Layout. In the Layout tab, we can choose some spacing. But notice it’s only putting spacing here and not actually between the numbers in the list.

So what we're going to do is come to this three dots menu for more options. We're going to choose Paragraph Options. When we choose Paragraph Options, we're going to tell it that we want potentially six points between each.

Then we want to make sure that this box right here—"Don't add space between paragraphs of the same style"—is unchecked. When we uncheck it, you’ll notice that now we have this nice space between the bullets.

And if we want that to be the standard bullet type, we can highlight the list. You'll notice that "List Paragraph" is a style. We can scroll to that style and, just like we did in other Bytes programs, we can click and update to match style.

So now, any list style in the document is going to pick up that spacing. You'll see that it picked up that spacing here.

You’ll also notice that it picked up some bolding. That was because some of the words in that list were bolded and some weren’t. So we’re going to just un-bold those, and we can go back and bold that later.

That works also between paragraphs. For example, you'll notice that there's not a lot still of space between this paragraph and that. Again, we can just highlight the paragraph and we can tell it that after each paragraph we want 12-point space after every paragraph.

And then again, if we like that, we can right-click and tell it that this is going to be our new normal font. So when we click that, it's going to now add a 12-point space after the paragraph.

All right. So these are really important in regards to when you're creating documents—making sure that you have proper spacing. You can also change spacing between letters.

There are some recommendations from accessibility experts that say that line height should be at least 1.5 times the font size; spacing following paragraphs to at least two times the font size; letter spacing should be 0.12 times the font size; and word spacing to at least 0.16 times the font size.

Now, a lot of this can be done in this program, online in Word. However, some of the trickier things, like letter spacing between characters, can only be done in the desktop version. And you can do that simply by clicking "Edit in Desktop" and change the font.

The default font spacing between characters is usually just fine. However, if you do want to be a little more picky and change those, feel free to go to the desktop version.

All right, I hope this was helpful and we'll see you at the next Bytes.

As you just saw, small changes can make a big difference. By choosing clear fonts, proper spacing, and thoughtful formatting, you make your content more accessible for everyone.

These aren't just good design choices. They're essential for inclusion.

Thank you for joining this Accessibility Byte. And remember, accessibility is a journey and every step you take makes a big impact.

Workshop Examples

Use the Workshop-Example-UnCorrected.docx to practice your accessibility skills. When you're ready, check your work against the Workshop-Example-Corrected.docx, which shows the final version after all corrections have been made.

Resources

GSA’s Guide to Accessible Lists: Learn how accessible lists help break down information into manageable parts, improving readability and navigation.GSA Article on Accessible Lists

The Accessibility Guy’s Tips on Accessible Canvas Lists: Learn how to create accessible lists in Canvas by using the Rich Content Editor to apply proper bulleted or numbered list formatting, ensuring clear structure for all users. The Accessibility Guy’s Article on Accessible Lists in Canvas

Why You Should Break Up Long Bullet Points: Learn why you should keep each bullet point in a list to 1 to 2 sentences long. Bureau of Internet Accessibility on Accessible Lists

Accessibility Checklists: Support for creating accessible materials.
- Microsoft Word Accessibility Checklist (Google Doc)
- Microsoft PowerPoint Accessibility Checklist (Google Doc)
- Microsoft Email Accessibility Checklist (Google Doc)
- Canvas Accessibility Checklist (Google Doc)