One of the biggest trends today is tiny text. Small-sized text elements have become a popular idea, but they also spark a lot of debate and controversy.

There’s no doubt that tiny text can cause some readability issues. However, when done well, these small text blocks with tiny fonts can actually help create visual accents and highlight key parts of a page. As a result, this draws visitors’ attention, and they are more likely to quickly notice the more important information. Sometimes, tiny text is also used as a photo effect, turning a regular image into a set of seemingly meaningless words. But that’s not really the case.

Let’s take a look at the tiny text trend with usage examples and create one of the most challenging effects in Photoshop .

Hierarchy

Large font sizes dominate homepages and headers, although there's an increasing need to fit a lot of information on the canvas. And while this works fine for high-resolution monitors (which are growing in popularity each year), it's a real issue for lower resolutions. This is where tiny text comes to the rescue. With a skillful mix of different font sizes in text blocks, you can fit a lot more content. And if you create something resembling a hierarchy and design small text in 14-16 points, you can draw users’ attention.

A great example of this solution can be seen in the project by Maxime Bonhomme , who used tiny text throughout his website to describe the key features of his works. He then used large font to provide full descriptions.

 

Effective Navigation

Using small fonts for menu items or dropdowns isn’t new. But given that most websites now use hamburger menus and hide navigation, returning to basics could be a great idea for renewal and creativity. Yes, using tiny text in navigation is tricky because everyone should be able to read it. If it’s too small, some visitors won’t be able to navigate the menu — and that means they might dislike the site altogether. So, a good solution is a simple, readable font without any effects.

The site Magic of Lapland is magical, enchanting, and interesting. Its entire design feels like it’s trying to lure you into a distant land to visit Santa Claus. But look at the top horizontal menu. It has lots of space between elements, and the font is not italic, without serifs or effects. It’s simple, which makes the dropdown items easy to read despite the tiny font size.

Emphasizing Space

When a web designer creates a site describing company services, operations, partners, and more, there’s always the desire to say as much as possible. And clients usually want the same — to tell more, so users understand what the company is about. But let’s think — what’s the role of tiny text in such projects? The fact is, the contrast between empty space and small text can do a lot. If there are many large text blocks on a single canvas, it’s hard to read them, and visitors get discouraged by the sight of “so much text.” Yes, it happens. But with a few small blocks, the effect is entirely different.

Before using tiny text in a specific project, ask yourself: why do I want to use small text here? What role will it play in the design of this project? And the answer shouldn't be “just because” or “why not.”

The site Moonfarmer perfectly demonstrates how tiny text can tell the story of a company, its services, and more. The site uses two levels of typography and lots of whitespace, which draws visitors in and invites them to scroll down to learn more. Yes, of course, small text is just one design detail, but it’s readable and poses no issues for various users.

Visualization

Text elements are primarily meant for reading. That’s logical and clear since childhood. But sometimes, text can act as part of the visual (graphic) content. This doesn’t mean it’s unimportant or plays a minor role in design. On the contrary, it can be even harder to implement. It requires planning, discussion, and alignment with the overall concept.

On the HTML Burger website, you can see very little text written in small font. The name is created using a large font. But tiny text is used on each section's logo, which creates a cool visual style and gives just enough information to understand what the company offers.

 

We’ve also gathered more examples of using tiny text in different styles. These include Accomplice , Victory Advisors , Oozora de Dakishimete , Ragnar Lite , Camilla Bellini , Alexander Gadjiev , Harajuku Dacci Pasta Labo , Mecenes du Sud

Huge Creative Potential of Photoshop

Tiny text can also be used as a photo effect — for example, when portraits or any other images are constructed from text. This effect is complex and doesn’t work with every photo, but it’s doable. Let’s look at a small example to understand the principle.

Take a street photo with houses, for instance, for a construction site. Open it in Photoshop and go to Select → Color Range → Shadows . A selection will appear. Copy it (Ctrl+C) and press Ctrl+J to create a new layer. Name it "Shadows".

 

Then go to Edit → Fill → Black and check the box to preserve transparency.

Now switch to the Background layer and choose Select → Color Range → Midtones . Again, copy the selection and create a new layer. Name it "Midtones" and fill it with 50% gray, preserving transparency.

 

Merge all layers together.

Create a new document and prepare the text or word set you’ll use. We took a few paragraphs from Wikipedia and copied them onto a new layer in a new document. Select the text and go to Edit → Define Brush Preset . Now you’ve created a new brush. You can close this document.

Important: the font style and type are defined when you create the brush. So if you want different words in different fonts or styles, you need to design them first, then create the brush.

Go back to the image, select it (Ctrl+A), and copy (Ctrl+C). Create two new empty layers. Fill one completely with white and turn it off. On the second layer, use the new brush to carefully apply the text. You can scale the brush, rotate it, randomize text or word placement, etc. Use your imagination.

 

Create a mask, click on it while holding Alt, and fill it with white. Make sure white is your foreground color. Paste the copied area onto the mask. Deselect and invert (Ctrl+I).

 

If you now switch to the text layer, you’ll see how the image becomes visible, and turning on the white layer will make it even more pronounced.

If you don’t like how the text was placed/drawn, just erase it from the text layer (leave the mask untouched) and reapply it with the brush.

You can also decorate the image with a gradient, add details, apply filters, or place a filled layer under the shadow range layer and reduce its fill to highlight details.

There are many ideas and variations. If you want, you can create brushes for each word (foundation, house, roof) and draw outlines with them. It’s harder, but the result is different. Here are some other examples.

 

The secret to drawing in typographic style lies in font and size selection. If the image is small and the text or words are large, it will look clumsy and out of place. Meanwhile, tiny text on large objects might get lost. That’s when it’s better to use brushes with individual words. Also, consider the direction and rotation of the brush. It’s one thing when all the text is horizontal, but quite another when it’s rotated — you can then draw outlines and objects (hands, fingers, roofs).

Conclusion

Should you use tiny text or not? It can be a tough decision, even though it’s quite common in publishing. For tiny text to work well in design, it’s important to have a lot of surrounding whitespace and to use a font that is easy and comfortable to read. At the same time, the surrounding space should help highlight text blocks.

The same goes for art effects. You can draw images using words and text, but it won’t be useful unless there’s meaning behind it. That meaning appears when parts of the text can actually be read . When someone looks at a house and sees and recognizes individual words or phrases — that’s when the image takes on meaning.

When experimenting with tiny fonts, use them wisely and sparingly. They work best when used in small amounts and placed intentionally.