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Did You Notice Something a Little Different?
UPDATE: Thanks for all the feedback! For those of you who were having issues with blurriness, we have good news: we pushed out an update this afternoon that improves the sharpness of the font for users who were affected. We’re monitoring all the comments and will keep you posted on any further updates.
If you’re a frequent visitor to Goodreads, you've probably noticed a few tweaks we’ve made to the fonts and colors on the desktop site today. Our goal with these small-but-important changes was to consolidate and refresh our visual styles and lay the groundwork for some design improvements that we’re planning in the future.
What’s different?
To enhance the readability of text on Goodreads, we’ve adopted two new open-source fonts. Lato, our sans-serif font, was designed by Warsaw-based designer Łukasz Dziedzic (“Lato” means “Summer” in Polish). Merriweather, our serif font, was created by Eben Sorkin and was designed to be pleasant to read on screens.
To make it easier to scan the page for information you need, we’ve touched up and modernized the design of common page layout elements like section headers, tabs and links.
To simplify and modernize our visual design, we’ve reduced the number of link colors we use, removed gradients from buttons and the site navigation, and applied a more harmonious color palette to interactive elements such as buttons, stars, and links.
Before:
Comments Showing 101-150 of 3,113 (3113 new)
message 102:
by
Princess Gabriel The Bookish Bookaholic of the Western Timbers of Librarianland (aka Gabriel the Bookaholic)
(new)
I like it, thought I am definitely NOT used to it. It looks so weird and small!
LOVE it! I'm using Chrome on a MacBook and it looks fab. The design is cohesive, clean and fresh.I really like both the typeface choices and the decision to nix the gradients works well to make the design feel less burdened and dowdy. Fab! I'm sure the naysayers will warm up to it soon enough :)
The font is difficult to read. I can't even see what I just wrote!
Sorry but it's hard to read now, I don't like the new font it's killing my eyes....
Too fine, too small, too light. Much more difficult to see and read.
Love the new look! I did notice that I can't link an author under "add book/author" anymore. It just lists books.
Morgan wrote: "I don't like it that now when you are currently reading a book and you update on what page you are on, now you have to guess the percentage instead of just putting the page number in. It is REALLY ..."Try clicking the "%" sign next to the box for your update. That should switch the option back to "pages."
Kira wrote: "Goodreads, are you trying to kill my eyesight with that hideous unreadable font?!!"I agree. It was hard enough to see before. Now it's worse.
I don't like the font either, it's a lot harder to read than it was with the old font.
The letters are crumbling in this font. And, it hurts the EYES!!!
Alexandra wrote: "Huge titles, tiny text, total chaos in fonts"
Thank you for the screenshot! Are you at 100% zoom on your browser in that image?
Nesrin wrote: "Maybe it's Chrome, but the font looks broken on GR now!
The Lato font is okay it seems, but the main font, Merriweather, is BS!"
What do you mean by "broken?" Would it be possible for you to add a screenshot?
terka wrote: "aw, the font makes the Czech letter ř look weird (comparison: r/ř Ř/R) :( at least it shows weirdly when books have it in the title. Example: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2......"
Thanks for pointing that out. Are you at 100% zoom?
I have no problem with modernizing the layout, but the new font is very fuzzy, like there is not enough resolution! :( Definitely not an improvent as it is!Please change it back or solve this! It hurts the eyes to read it!
this font seems extremely blurry..the general redesign looks great, but actually reading some longer reviews is quite straining
Cue GR readers freaking out because of the new font in 7-6-5-4-3-2- 1, we have blast off people!
The font on the "Currently Reading" is too light, could use some darkening.
much much harder to read this font. I've tried to get used to it but it just makes my eyes hurt.
Emily, please, please, please let us at least have the OPTION to switch back.
I don't mind the new layout but I don't like the font.
The new cleaner look is actually quite nice. But the font... I have to agree with the other comments, it's not easy to read and doesn't look very good
I'll have to stop using GR if it stays like this.
It's a bit jarring, but I'll get used to it, I guess (I liked the old style better). Also, is it just me, or does the "add author" feature not work?
It's not easier to read at all. It's actually more difficult. It looks like some letters are missing and I have to strain to read it.
Oh no, when I scroll through my update feed now everything blends together. I liked the different colors so I could distinguish names, book titles etc. but now everything looks the same. :'(
Yeah, I liked the earlier font. Maybe just do the serif one on tablets instead of desktop too if you're worried about that? Everything else is weird, but stomachable.
I actually find it harder to find the right category (at least in the right side column) with the new section headers, it feels like they are to much like the rest now and it all kind of floats together. It do kind of look a bit more modern, but not practical.And as some people said, the font looks kind of broken at some places (using firefox)
I also find it much harder to read. Many parts of letters are missing and is just not good for my sight at all. At least give us a choice, please. By trying to make things more accessible, you're actually making it less accessible for many of us.
I think it's actually a lot harder now to find what I want because the sections are less defined, especially on profiles. Everything blends together and it's hard to tell where a new section starts.The new blue/teal color will take some getting used to since I associate goodreads with green, but it's not bad. I love the modernized font in the editing areas (comments and reviews).
The sizing of all text across the site seems very inconsistent. A lot of the text seems smaller but for links and review editing it seems huge.
Rainbowheart wrote: "Emily, please, please, please let us at least have the OPTION to switch back."Triple this. This resolution is doing my head in and I'm actually feeling a little nauseous a bit. Me thinks I'll come back later to try again.
It's absolutely horrid. Completely unreadable. The font and the colors are practically invisible, I have to squint to see them. Please offer an option to change it back if an individual wants to. I spend a lot of time on Goodreads and this makes it practically unusable for me.
I'm already blind as a bat and this new font is making me want to run out and get my vision checked, again. It's blurry and hard to read. I've already tried to change my screen setting to see if I can clear it up. It didn't work. I probably won't be able to spend more than five minutes at a time on the site without getting a headache. I do like the colors. The font needs help.
The font is super-choppy and hard to read, no matter how much I enlarge it. 90 seconds of this and I already have a headache. Hate hate hate.
I am finding the font to be too small. I have excellent eyesight and I'm only in my 30s! I also don't like the blue text on a blueish gray background (like in the "message by:....." headers) . I imagine I'll get used to it all, I usually do.
Hmm... the colours need some getting used to. I liked the green of the "want to read" button better before..The new fonts are nice, but maybe decrease the letter-spacing of the merryweather font. There is a bit too much white space between the letters which makes the letters "swim" and decreases the readability.
I don't see any missing letters and the font size is actually bigger so no complaints there. (I'm using Safari at the moment. Maybe tomorrow when I look at it in Chrome it's a different story..)
yeah this font is unreadable. the layout is fine, but these letters are horrible
Sorry, but I find it REALLY hard to read on my laptop and I shudder to think what this will be like on my phone! The font is horrible. Please could you include an option to go back to the original. I LOVE GR, but this font will drive me away!
[insert melodramatic overreaction to change here]
Jerome wrote: "It's a bit jarring, but I'll get used to it, I guess (I liked the old style better). Also, is it just me, or does the "add author" feature not work?"I noticed too
![Cheshire Cat [Heidi]~ We're All Mad Here ~](https://images.gr-assets.com/users/1454696753p1/40221410.jpg)
Rainbowheart wrote: "I'll have to stop using GR if it stays like this."Whoa, now, let's not be rash. I love Goodreads, and I wouldn't stop using it just because of a weird font.
Kira wrote: "Goodreads, are you trying to kill my eyesight with that hideous unreadable font?!!"I agree. I was reading my kindle and went to check Goodreads and thought something was wrong with my eyes.. It wasn't like this an hour ago.... BOOOOOHHHH I don't like it!!!
Joe wrote: "It looks terrible. About 10% of all the letters are just missing on my screen, like they all have holes in them. Enlarging or shrinking the font doesn't fix it."you have to update your browser
The main problem is that everything is so BLURRY! It's like everything is dancing all over the page. Things are running together. I can't read them. It's not just an aesthetic problem, it's a functional problem.