Why large print needs checking
Large print is one of the biggest niches in puzzle books, and one of the most reviewed. Buyers are often older solvers or people with low vision, and they notice immediately when a book sold as large print has a 16pt title and 9pt word lists. A one-star review that says "not really large print" is hard to recover from. The fix is to decide the smallest size anything in the book may print at, and check that every puzzle still fits at that size.
The common standards
- Under 14pt: standard print. Most regular puzzle books use 10 to 12pt word lists.
- 14 to 15pt: enlarged. Easier to read, but short of what most buyers expect from the words large print.
- 16 to 17pt: large print. The floor most large-print puzzle books on Amazon use.
- 18pt and up: the size low-vision organisations recommend, and a good fit for an extra large print edition.
How the grid fit is worked out
Letters in a word search sit in squares, and a letter can fill about 70% of its square before the grid gets hard to circle. So a 16pt letter needs a square of about 23pt. The checker divides the space available on one page by that square size to find the biggest grid that fits, using the same page budget our Book Studio uses. Crosswords are held back by their clue numbers, which also need to reach the minimum. Sudoku is always 9 x 9, so the question is simply whether it fits.
These are estimates. When you build in the Book Studio with large print turned on, it measures every page and tells you about anything that falls below the size you chose, rather than shipping it silently. For page count and printing cost, see the page count calculator.
Frequently asked questions
What font size counts as large print?
There is no single legal definition, but 16pt is the common floor for books sold as large print, and organisations for low-vision readers such as the American Printing House for the Blind recommend 18pt. Below 14pt a book is standard print. This checker labels 14 to 15pt as enlarged rather than large print.
Does large print apply to the whole puzzle?
It should. Readers notice when the title is huge but the word list or the clue numbers are 9pt. A real large-print puzzle book keeps every piece of text at or above the minimum, including grid letters, word lists, clue numbers, page numbers and the answer key.
What is the biggest word search grid for large print?
On 8.5 x 11 inch pages, about 17 x 17 at 16pt, printed one puzzle per page with the word list on the facing page if needed. At 18pt it drops to about 15 x 15. On a 6 x 9 trim, 16pt letters limit you to roughly an 11 x 11 grid, which is why most large-print puzzle books are 8.5 x 11.
Why are crosswords harder to make in large print?
Because the small clue numbers in the corner of each square also need to reach the large-print size. That makes every square much bigger than the letter alone would need, so a large-print crossword grid is smaller than a word search grid at the same point size.
Is the on-screen sample exactly the printed size?
Close, but not exact. Browsers treat 1 point as 1/72 of an inch at a nominal screen resolution, and real screens vary. For a true check, print the page at 100% scale and look at it at reading distance.