Helvetica
Helvetica
Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann, 1957
Sans-serif · Neutral corporate modernism. So common it reads as no choice at all — which was the intent.
Released as Neue Haas Grotesk and renamed Helvetica in 1960 for export, from Helvetia, the Latin name for Switzerland. The design goal was neutrality — letterforms with no expression of their own, so the words carry the meaning — and it succeeded so completely that it became the most-used typeface in history and the subject of a feature documentary. Apple used it as the iOS system font until 2015.
How to tell it apart
| Mistaken for | Which letters to check |
|---|---|
| Arial | The fastest tells are the capital R, whose leg is straight and angled on Helvetica but curved on Arial; the lowercase t, which is flat-topped on Helvetica and angled on Arial; and the terminals on C, S and e, which are horizontal on Helvetica and cut at an angle on Arial. |
| Akzidenz-Grotesk | Akzidenz is less regularised — its letters vary more in width and weight. Helvetica smoothed all of that out. |
The facts
- Designed by
- Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann
- Released
- 1957
- Classification
- Sans-serif
- What it signals now
- Neutral corporate modernism. So common it reads as no choice at all — which was the intent.
Where you have seen it
- The New York City Subway
- American Apparel
- Jeep
- Target
- BMW
- Panasonic
- Roughly everything
Other typefaces from the 1950s
| Typeface | Year | Designer | What it signals |
|---|---|---|---|
| Courier | 1955 | Howard Kettler | A typewriter, a screenplay, or code written before syntax highlighting. |
| Univers | 1957 | Adrian Frutiger | Systematic Swiss design. The typeface for people who find Helvetica sloppy. |
| Optima | 1958 | Hermann Zapf | Elegant, slightly classical. Cosmetics, memorials, luxury that does not want to shout. |
This page describes the typeface rather than showing it. Displaying a specimen requires a licensed font file and almost none of these may be redistributed, so the descriptions name the letters to look at instead.
Common questions
- Who designed Helvetica?
- Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann, in 1957.
- What is Helvetica used for?
- Neutral corporate modernism. So common it reads as no choice at all — which was the intent. You will have seen it on The New York City Subway, American Apparel, Jeep.
- What is the difference between Helvetica and Arial?
- The fastest tells are the capital R, whose leg is straight and angled on Helvetica but curved on Arial; the lowercase t, which is flat-topped on Helvetica and angled on Arial; and the terminals on C, S and e, which are horizontal on Helvetica and cut at an angle on Arial.
Related pages
- Arial Routinely mistaken for this one
- Akzidenz-Grotesk Routinely mistaken for this one
- Typefaces from the 1950s 4 here
- Akzidenz-Grotesk H. Berthold AG, 1896
- Franklin Gothic Morris Fuller Benton, 1902
- Johnston Edward Johnston, 1916
- Futura Paul Renner, 1927
- Gill Sans Eric Gill, 1928
- Univers Adrian Frutiger, 1957
- Optima Hermann Zapf, 1958
- Eurostile Aldo Novarese, 1962
Sources
- Official vendor product documentation — At One Place