Twitter introduces new font Chirp—and users are already complaining of headaches
Notice anything different on Twitter today?
The social media site has updated their new desktop font to their first custom “Chirp,” a sans-serif rounded font type that aims to be “ the life of the party”— font-wise. This serves as the site's typeface change after SF Pro, Roboto, and the most recent Helvetica Neue.
Twitter took to, well, Twitter to announce the news.
In January, we revealed our new font, Chirp — and it’s ready for you to use today.
All Western-language text now aligns left, making it easier to read as you scroll. Non-Western languages remain unchanged.https://t.co/nlgxXJs5F6— Twitter Design (@TwitterDesign) August 11, 2021
"We wanted an art-first approach to our brand identity that encompassed emotion and expression,” Twitter shared in a separate blog post. "So rather than build the system up from each component part or build around a specific element, we embarked upon building a creative design system that’s intentionally imperfect."
Twitter’s creative director, Derrit DeRouen provided more context on the process to create Chirp in his own thread.
"Our key objective with this brand refresh is to improve how we convey emotion and imperfection," he shared, as they eventually went to work with Swiss Type Foundry, Grilli Type to create the propriety font.
Rounded tittles and punctuation introduce a humanist character. The result is a versatile, contemporary family (82 styles across Standard and Display!) with international sensibilities. It accomplishes exactly what we need and it has made itself the hero of our refresh. pic.twitter.com/3pvcdmKmrI
— Derrit DeRouen (@DerritDeRouen) January 27, 2021
The font isn’t the only visual change so far, as they’ve also updated colors in higher contrast, turned the dial down on the blue buttons, and added more line spaces between text.
Giving headaches?
Amid the praise, a few Twitter users are voicing out that the new font is giving them headaches with rounded corners and color choice when screens are on dark mode.
I think this update is also meant to make things more accessible, but holy fuck I'm getting a headache because of how sharp the font is on top of a black background
— Naz (@BluSpringg) August 11, 2021
I can't tell what it is, but the new font is actually giving me a bit of a headache? It feels almost slightly blurry or something ;w;
— ? Arcaea Neeko ? VTuber (@NeekoArcaea) August 11, 2021
Uhm.. Uhhhh. No. "Accessible" would be adding an option to let your consumers choose their own fonts, not forcing them to use one's that aren't entirely dyslexia friendly. Accessible would be adding options to prevent private Quote tweeting. Adding an option to change colour- https://t.co/g5RoiREDPt
— Bless/Lemon The Beloved ? ?? (@BlessBeloathed) August 11, 2021
Bruhh the new font is giving me headache https://t.co/lrUpBosIhW
— Anirudh S (@anirudh_2103_) August 11, 2021
Others have even gone as far as to change the font on desktop by tweaking their browser's Developer Tools. It didn't work for us, though.
here's how to disable the new font on web browser! open the JS console (https://t.co/Z1fZeGLlws), and paste in THIS TEXT:
— Twilight Sparkle (@yourcompanionAI) August 11, 2021
document.cookie="ab_decider=responsive_web_chirp_font_enabled=false&responsive_web_nav_visual_refresh_enabled=false"
then press enter and reload
How are you liking Chirp so far?