Module 5: Cartography Foundations

5.4 Typography in Maps

Typefaces, hierarchy, and label placement — how letters carry half the meaning on any map.

Lesson 25 of 100·17 min read

Key takeaways

Typography is half of cartography — bad type ruins otherwise beautiful maps.

Match typeface to the map's register and hierarchy.

Label placement follows established rules that any automated labeller tries to match.

Introduction

Look at any great historical map — Robinson's Atlas, National Geographic's century of work, modern Mapbox designs — and you'll notice the type is doing enormous amounts of work. Labels identify features, signal hierarchy, suggest mood, and navigate the reader's eye. This lesson covers the typographic choices every cartographer makes.

Choosing a typeface

Two decisions determine everything: serif vs sans serif and family count.

Serif typefaces (Minion, Caslon, Garamond) have small feet at letter ends. They suggest tradition, formality, editorial authority.
Sans serif typefaces (Helvetica, Inter, Roboto, Open Sans) are cleaner, more modern, more legible at small sizes.

For most contemporary maps, sans serif is the safer choice. Use serif when:

The map is part of a print publication with serif body text.
The register is formal or historical.
You pair serif titles with sans-serif labels for visual contrast.

Limit to two families. More reads as chaotic.

Typographic hierarchy

Different elements deserve different type treatments:

Element	Typical treatment
Title	Large, bold, colour of primary brand or black.
Subtitle	Medium size, regular weight, muted colour.
Country/region labels	Medium, regular, all caps or small caps.
City labels	Small to medium, regular.
Small places / villages	Small, light, regular.
Water features	Italic, blue, often all caps.
Physical features (mountains, forests)	Italic, serif, colour-keyed.
Credits / sources	Smallest, muted grey.

Italics for water is a centuries-old convention that readers now subconsciously expect.

Label placement

For a single point label, the preferred order (after Imhof's classic Positioning Names on Maps):

Upper right.
Upper left.
Lower right.
Lower left.
Directly right.
Directly left.
Directly above.
Directly below.

Automatic label placement engines (Maplex, QGIS PAL, Mapbox's Tippecanoe) optimise against overlaps following similar rules.

For lines (rivers, roads), labels curve along the line. For polygons (countries, lakes), labels follow the feature's shape, often stretched or compressed for emphasis.

Avoiding label clutter

Don't label everything. Choose the important features.
Vary label density by zoom. Show few labels at small scales, more at large scales.
Halo text — a thin white outline around labels — keeps them readable over complex backgrounds.
Drop labels that overlap rather than squeezing them.
Offset labels from busy features — dense road networks need cleaner label zones.

Case choices

Title case (First Letter Each Word) — cities, countries.
ALL CAPS — major features, regions, oceans.
small caps — subtle emphasis without ALL-CAPS shouting.
Sentence case — rarely used on maps except for footnotes.

Avoid Italic ALL CAPS — it's nearly illegible.

Size and leading

At 300 dpi print: 6–8 pt minimum for labels; 10–12 pt for most map type; 18–36 pt for titles.
On screen: 11–14 px minimum for labels; legibility drops fast below 10 px.
Line spacing (leading) around 120 % of font size.
Tracking (letter spacing) tighter for headlines, wider for all-caps labels.

Colour of type

Black or near-black for dense, high-contrast text.
White or light grey for labels over dark base maps (use a subtle dark halo).
Colour-keyed labels (e.g., blue for water, brown for mountains) — only when the convention is clear and consistent.
Avoid low-contrast combinations (pale grey on white).

Multilingual maps

Some regions require multiple scripts (Latin + Arabic, for example). Key decisions:

Primary script large, secondary smaller.
Or equal weight if both audiences matter equally.
Font must support both scripts at similar visual weights.
Script-appropriate punctuation and numerals.

A practical walkthrough

For a city map:

Set title in a strong sans serif (e.g., Inter 24 pt bold).
Country / state labels in Inter 10 pt ALL CAPS, dark grey.
City labels in Inter 8 pt, black, with white halo.
Water bodies in Inter Italic 9 pt, deep blue.
Road labels in a narrower weight, 7 pt, positioned along lines.
Legend: 9 pt regular body, 10 pt bold header.
Credits: 6 pt regular grey at the bottom.

Review on a print proof and adjust.

Self-check exercises

1. Why italicise water feature labels?

Centuries of cartographic convention — readers subconsciously associate italics with water. Deviating from the convention works against reader expectations. Italic also contrasts visually with regular-roman land-feature labels, adding subtle hierarchy.

2. You have dense label overlap in an urban area. What three techniques help?

(1) Drop lower-priority labels at that zoom level. (2) Add halo to improve readability over complex backgrounds. (3) Vary label placement — use the 8-position preference list; allow automatic placement engines to optimise. Reducing label density or showing more at larger zooms are also valid tactics.

3. Is it okay to use ALL CAPS for every label on a map?

Almost never. ALL CAPS is slower to read than title case and rapidly fatigues the reader. Reserve it for major features where ALL CAPS adds clear hierarchy (OCEANS, REGIONS, COUNTRIES). Use title case for cities and lower-level features.

Summary

Choose one or two typefaces; match the map's register.
Label hierarchy uses size, weight, case, and italic to signal importance.
Follow established placement conventions; use halo to maintain readability.
Test at intended output size — type that looks fine at 100 % may be unreadable at print.