OpenDyslexic

See it for yourself

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OpenDyslexic

Reading should not be hard work. A font gives every letter its own shape, so b and d stop trading places and words hold still on the line. Try the quick brown fox — then try it in your own font and see which one your eyes settle into.

Arial, for comparison

Reading should not be hard work. A font gives every letter its own shape, so b and d stop trading places and words hold still on the line. Try the quick brown fox — then try it in your own font and see which one your eyes settle into.

The b / d / p / q test

These four letters are the same shape rotated and flipped in most fonts. A font designed for dyslexia gives each one its own look. Compare:

OpenDyslexic

b d p q

Arial

b d p q

How it works

Heavy bottoms

Every OpenDyslexic letter is thicker at the bottom than the top, like weight in the keel of a boat. The idea is to give each letter a clear "this way up," so letters are less likely to appear flipped or rotated while you read.

No mirror twins

In most fonts, b, d, p and q are one shape reused four ways — mirrored and rotated. OpenDyslexic redraws them with different slants and tails so each has its own identity. That is the claim the demo above lets you check with your own eyes rather than take on trust.

Room to breathe

The font builds in wider letter and word spacing. When letters sit too close together they start to visually interfere with each other — researchers call it crowding — and extra space is the one typography change with consistently good evidence behind it, whatever font it is applied to.

Where it came from

OpenDyslexic was created by Abbie Gonzalez, a developer in New Hampshire, and released in 2011. At the time the best-known dyslexia typeface was Dyslexie, by the Dutch designer Christian Boer — but Dyslexie was a paid, licensed font. Gonzalez built a free alternative on top of the open-source DejaVu fonts and gave it away.

That decision is most of why you have seen it. Because anyone could bundle it at no cost, OpenDyslexic spread into e-readers, apps, and browser tools — Amazon added it to every Kindle in 2015, and it has been in assistive tools like Helperbird ever since. The font is maintained to this day under the SIL Open Font License.

There is a lesson in it that has nothing to do with letter shapes: the free, open version of an idea travels further than the patented one.

Who it helps — honestly

Here is the truthful picture, because you deserve it before you change every page you read: controlled studies have not shown that OpenDyslexic makes people read faster or more accurately on average. A 2017 study of students with dyslexia found no improvement in reading rate or accuracy compared with Arial and Times New Roman, and most participants preferred other fonts.

And yet some readers swear by it — they find text calmer, less crowded, and less tiring, and they read more because of it. Both things are true at once. Averages are not individuals, and comfort that keeps you reading is worth having even when a stopwatch cannot see it.

So the honest advice is: try it on text you actually read, next to Lexend and a plain font with wider spacing, and keep whichever one your eyes argue for. That is why the demo on this page exists, and why Helperbird treats fonts as a preference to explore rather than a prescription.

Try it in Helperbird

Helperbird brings these tools to any website, PDF, or Google Doc — no copying text anywhere, and nothing you read leaves your browser.

Step-by-step: How to switch any page to a dyslexia font

Questions people ask

Is OpenDyslexic free?

Yes. OpenDyslexic is open source under the SIL Open Font License, so anyone can download it, use it, and build it into apps at no cost. Helperbird includes it on the free plan.

How do I get OpenDyslexic on Google Docs?

Google Docs does not offer OpenDyslexic in its font menu. Helperbird applies it on top of the page instead, so a Doc displays in OpenDyslexic for you without changing the document for anyone else.

Does OpenDyslexic actually work?

The research is honestly mixed. Studies have not found that it makes people read faster or more accurately on average, but some readers strongly prefer it and find reading more comfortable. Comfort is a real result — the only way to know is to try it on real text, which is what the demo above is for.

What is the difference between OpenDyslexic and Lexend?

They take different approaches. OpenDyslexic changes letter shapes and weights them at the bottom. Lexend keeps conventional shapes but expands spacing and width in measured steps. Some readers do better with one, some with the other, and some with neither — both are in Helperbird, so you can compare on the same page.

See it for yourself

The b / d / p / q test

How it works

Heavy bottoms

No mirror twins

Room to breathe

Where it came from

Who it helps — honestly

Try it in Helperbird

Questions people ask

Related information

Sources