Blog · 8 min read · April 6, 2026
Comic Sans and dyslexia: myth vs reality
Comic Sans is the internet's punchline. It is also, quietly, one of the most-recommended fonts by the British Dyslexia Association. Both things are true, and the reason is more interesting than either the jokes or the evangelism suggest.
Why dyslexic readers like Comic Sans
Comic Sans was drawn by Vincent Connare at Microsoft in 1994 for a cartoon-bubble interface. Three features of that design turned out to coincide with properties that help some dyslexic readers:
- Irregular letterforms. Unlike a typical sans-serif, Comic Sans letters aren't perfectly geometric. Each "a" is slightly different from each "o". That irregularity reduces the ambiguity that some dyslexic readers encounter when letter shapes are too similar.
- Open apertures. The "c", "e", "a" and "s" have generous openings, which helps legibility at small sizes.
- Informal baseline. Letters are slightly uneven on the baseline, creating a natural rhythm that's easier for some readers to follow.
The British Dyslexia Association's Style Guide (2018) lists Comic Sans as an acceptable dyslexia-friendly font for this reason.
Why Comic Sans is still a compromise
Comic Sans was drawn as a display font, not a reading font. Its spacing is uneven. Its proportions shift between weights. At long-form reading length, it gets tiring. And of course, using it on anything business-y has unavoidable social consequences.
Enter Comic Neue
Craig Rozynski's Comic Neue (2014) was a direct response: keep the helpful informal letter shapes, but fix the spacing, proportion and weight balance that make Comic Sans poor for long reading. The result reads like a grown-up version of Comic Sans — friendly shapes, professional rhythm.
For dyslexic readers who benefit from informal letterforms, Comic Neue is a strictly better choice than Comic Sans.
How to use Comic Neue on every website
- Install LexiFont.
- Start your 7-day Pro trial (Comic Neue is part of Pro).
- Click the extension icon and pick Comic Neue.
Comic Neue is bundled inside LexiFont under the SIL Open Font License 1.1 — used without modification.
Who should try Comic Neue
- Children with dyslexia (and parents who don't want to put Comic Sans on a schoolbook).
- Adults who swear Comic Sans works for them and want something that works as well without the social cost.
- Readers who find very formal fonts (e.g. Times, Georgia) hard to sustain over long articles.
Recommended settings for Comic Neue
- Font size: 1.05×. It's slightly smaller than other sans-serifs.
- Line height: 1.7.
- Letter spacing: 0.
Install LexiFont — 7-day Pro trial