--- description: BIC, the company behind ball-point pens, has created a typeface that is perfectly average—a compendium of example letters from all over. title: This Is the World’s Most Average Font image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6b0454197f3c221b/69869b45e8524b6605603d4a/time_handwriting.jpg?branch=production&width=1920&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Newsfeed](/tag/time-section-newsfeed/) ## Newsfeed Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # This Is the World’s Most Average Font by [Kyle Chayka](/author/kyle-chayka/) ## Kyle Chayka Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jul 10, 2014 6:10 PM CUT  Universal Typeface Project by [Kyle Chayka](/author/kyle-chayka/) ## Kyle Chayka Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jul 10, 2014 6:10 PM CUT Before we all give up handwriting for good in lieu of touchscreens, the [Universal Typeface Project](http://theuniversaltypeface.com/home "undefined") is attempting to figure out what exactly the world’s average handwriting looks like. The project aims to develop a new font determined by thousands of individuals writing out there ABC’s, traces that can be seen on the project’s website. The exact averages form an elegant kind of Comic Sans—which was supposed to approximate informal handwriting but failed utterly. These are the platonic ideals of English-language letters. Mousing over each version of a letter brings up the name and location of the person who wrote it. Rather than standardizing our language, the Universal Typeface actually restores a sense of individuality to typefaces online—it’s poetically organic rather than strictly designed to always look the same. It’s possible to sort the handwriting by country or gender, seeing how it varies for different writers. The letters are even ever-changing as more people contribute their own handwriting. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/2973599/this-is-the-worlds-most-average-font/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/2973599/this-is-the-worlds-most-average-font/"},"headline":"This Is the World’s Most Average Font","datePublished":"2014-07-10T18:10:11.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:11:34.514Z","description":"Better than Comic Sans!","url":"https://time.com/2973599/this-is-the-worlds-most-average-font/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Internet","language"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6b0454197f3c221b/69869b45e8524b6605603d4a/time_handwriting.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Kyle Chayka","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/kyle-chayka/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6b0454197f3c221b/69869b45e8524b6605603d4a/time_handwriting.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"time_handwriting","caption":"","creditText":"Universal Typeface Project","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/2973599/this-is-the-worlds-most-average-font/","name":"This Is the World’s Most Average Font"}}]}] ```