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Web-safe standard fonts

The standard fonts sets can seem limiting if you’re more used to print work, but in fact they’re not at all bad for setting paragraphs of text. Georgia is a particularly clear serif font at small sizes, as is the sans-serif Verdana. Both of these were designed by Matthew Carter for Microsoft, and are excellent choices when legibility is paramount. Trebuchet MS is another good sans-serif font for body text, and it sets smaller than the rather wide-bodied Verdana. Arial is actually not too bad, although it isn’t quite as well sculpted for use as on-screen body text. The rest of the web-safe serifs and sans fonts - meaning Helvetica, Times and Times New Roman, and Geneva - are safe in the sense that they’re good as backups that are generally going to be available, but they’re not as good in terms of clarity.