How to Adjust the Font Rendering in Windows 7

Posted on November 9, 2009 at 5:22 am

Is it hard to read the text on your new Windows 7 machine? Is all the text looking a little fuzzy and giving you a headache? If you have any of these issues, you may have to calibrate your display for rendering text.

By default, Windows 7 enables ClearType, which is software technology that is supposed to help improve the readability of text on LCDs and flat panel monitors.

To tune or adjust the way fonts render on Windows 7, click on the Start orb, then type in cttune.exe. This is the ClearType Text Tuner.

windows 7 font rendering

You’ll first be asked whether you or not want to keep ClearType enabled or not. Here is what the different looks like with ClearType on and off.

windows 7 cleartype

windows 7 font smoothing

Can you tell which one is using ClearType? The above paragraph has ClearType turned on and the lower paragraph has it turned off. As you can see, the bottom paragraph looks a bit more fuzzy.

You can uncheck ClearType, however, if you do not want any kind of font smoothing. When you click Next, you’ll walk through four screen with several versions of the same text.

windows 7 fuzzy text

You are supposed to choose the text sample that looks the best to you. Keep clicking next and choosing the best looking text from all the different samples. This should definitely help make text on Windows 7 look much better and to your liking.

Note that if the text is still looking fuzzy or stretched, you may have to adjust the your monitor resolution. You can change the resolution in Windows 7 by going to the Control Panel and clicking on Appearance and Personalization.

Then click on the Adjust screen resolution link below the Display heading:

adjust screen resolution

Now choose a different resolution from the drop down menu. When you choose a new resolution, click the Apply button afterwards instead of OK. The screen will switch to the new resolution for a few seconds and then ask you if you want to leave it at that or change it back.

change windows 7 resolution

If you are still having problems with text display properly in Widows 7, leave a comment here and I will try to help!

» Filed Under Windows 7

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Comments

5 Responses to “How to Adjust the Font Rendering in Windows 7”

  1. Sagas said on :

    Hi I have tried all the given guidelines to adjust my font size and resolution, but no success. Under the resolution I am only given one option of 640X480, no other resolution sizes, how can I bring the resolution options back?


  2. Timothy said on :

    Is there anyway to make fonts looks like those on XP? I tried turning off font smoothing and disabling cleartype (which gets worse). They all look fuzzy.


  3. akishore said on :

    @Timothy – What kind of hardware are you running Windows 7 on? If the fonts are looking fuzzy in Windows 7, check the monitor resolution and make sure your video driver is up-to-date. If the video card is pretty old, you may have to replace it.


  4. gerry eaton said on :

    Tried all that. The font’s are still fuzzy in Windows 7. I have reinstalled xp and the fonts are clear and crisp.

    benq 24 lcd nvidia 9500 gt 2.8 dual core Pentium 4 gigs ram.

    Win 7 not good! I wil stay with good old xp.


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  1. Windows 7 Color Calibrate – How to Calibrate your Monitor Says:

    [...] Tuner to make sure the fonts appear clean and sharp. You can read my previous post on how to adjust font rendering in Windows 7. After that, just click Finish to save your changes. Enjoy! AKPC_IDS += [...]

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