Arial

Arial is a sans-serif typeface designed in 1982 by Robin Nicholas and Patricia Saunders for Monotype. It was intended as a modern, general-purpose font and as a metrically compatible substitute for Helvetica, intended for licensing and digital production.

The design features a neutral, readable form with a tall x-height and clean, simple shapes suitable for long passages and small text. Arial differs from Helvetica in some details of stroke width and curvature, giving it its own visual identity while preserving a similar sans-serif appearance.

Arial became widespread with the rise of personal computing and was bundled with many Microsoft products and Windows operating systems in the 1990s and 2000s, making it one of the most common typefaces for screens and documents.

The family includes several variants such as Arial Black, Arial Narrow, Arial Rounded MT Bold, and Arial Unicode MS; the latter provides extended Unicode character support for a wide range of languages.

While often used as a substitute for Helvetica, Arial is a distinct font with its own metrics and design features. It remains widely used on the web and in digital documents worldwide.