Apple Mail Font size problems solved

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Guern2020 Author

Level 1

45 points

Apple Mail Font size problems solved

There are various discussions about the very small font size in Apple Mail. eg

Apple Emails printing with VERY small font - Apple Community

Apple Mail font size too small for father - Apple Community

No one seemed to know how to solve the problem.

It turns out that Mail font is not too small after all - it is just using a different unit of measurement - 'pixels', whereas anyone used to the Microsoft world and Outlook uses 'points'.

12 points in Outlook equates to 16 pixels in Apple Mail. So if you use font size 12 in Apple it will be too small.

This doesn't just apply to Apple; other programs like Proton use pixels, too.

See https://blog.gimm.io/difference-between-pixel-px-and-point-pt-font-sizes-in-email-signatures/

and https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/34164/is-there-a-unified-font-size-metric-across-all-applications

One wonders why Apple (unlike Microsoft), in the mail settings, couldn't make clear the units used. :-(

(eg Change Fonts & Colours settings in Mail on Mac)

Hope this helps someone else!

iMac 27″ 5K

Posted on Nov 12, 2023 08:33 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Tony Tapir

Level 1

34 points

Dec 4, 2023 02:50 AM in response to BDAqua

I have been looking at this for a while.

Definitely a just a bug from what I see.

My default mail font is Helvetica 12pt. I also have a signature with the same font and 12pt (one blank line then my name)

If I open a new mail and start typing from line one (the mail body), and continue, everything looks fine. When I print it, the text is small, but the signature is (12pt and larger). To match the signature font, I have to go up to 14pt in the body. This looks odd on the screen and to the recipient, but the printing font is pretty close and readable.

As a work around, I start typing in the second line of the email (the bank line from the 12pt signature) and everything appears in 12pt on the screen, to the recipient and in print form.

I have MacOS Sonoma 14.1.2 (23B92) BTW.

Sort it out Apple!

Cheers

Tony

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Answer 2

BDAqua

Level 10

250,007 points

Nov 12, 2023 10:57 AM in response to Guern2020

👍:)

Might it not depend on ppi of the monitor?

https://appleinsider.com/articles/23/02/16/what-a-retina-display-is-and-why-it-matters#:~:text=This%20specification%20of%20300%20ppi,definition%20of%20a%20Retina%20display.

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Answer 3

BDAqua

Level 10

250,007 points

Dec 4, 2023 02:52 AM in response to Tony Tapir

Thanks! :)

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Answer 4

scc4

Level 1

8 points

Jul 17, 2024 08:22 AM in response to Guern2020

There seems to be a problem in the iOS/iPhone with text sizing in the Mail app.

When I swipe down to access the Control Panel settings for type size/Mail Only, adjustments from 100%-110-120 seem to have no effect on type size. When I switch to 135%, the type size triples in size making reading as awkward as the tiny size. This looks like an obvious bug.

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Apple Mail Font size problems solved

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