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If you are using MacOS, unfortunately, your issue is that you are using a 1440p monitor, not an issue with any one program.

Apple has removed support for font rendering methods which make text on non-integer scaled screens look sharper. As a result, if you want to use your screen without blurry text, you have to use 1080p (1x), 4k (2x 1080p), 5k (2x 1440p) or 6k screens (or any other screens where integer scaling looks ok).

To see the difference, try connecting a Windows/Linux machine to your monitor and comparing how text looks compared to the same screen with a MacOS device.



This comment is incorrect, I have tried the editor on both MacOS and Linux, and texts looks like crap on both if you're using your screen at its native resolution. The difference is easily visible in screenshots.

Example Zed screenshot, using "Ayu Light": https://i.ibb.co/Nr8SjvR/Screenshot-from-2024-07-28-13-11-10...

Same code in VS Code: https://i.ibb.co/YZfPXvZ/Screenshot-from-2024-07-28-13-13-41...


Looks like anti-aliasing on a hi-dpi monitor which you shouldn't do.


It's not, the font renderer just sucks outside of high-DPI displays.


It looks ok to me, definitely not blurred. If you do not like it so thin you can increase the font weight or change the theme?


I'm on Linux (Ubuntu) and haven't had this blurry font issue with any other application that I've installed over the years.


Yeah the reason is Linux is supporting non integer scaling. Apple stubbornly doesn't


This issue happens without any scaling at all, on both Linux and MacOS.


native resolution on any monitor should work fine on MacOS.

using pixel fonts on any non-integer multiplier of the native resolution will always result in horrible font rendering, I don't care what OS you're on.

I use MacOS on all kinds of displays as I move throughout the day, some of them are 1x, some are 2x, and some are somewhere in between. using a vector font in Zed looks fine on all of them. It did not look fine when I used a pixel font that I created for myself, but that's how pixel fonts work, not the fault of MacOS.


macOS fonts subjectively look terrible and objectively look blurry on normal resolution monitors because:

1) No hinting

2) No subpixel rendering


Both hinting and subpixel rendering are things on MacOS. MacOS just doesn’t color the pixel for LCDs like Windows does, because the GUI on MacOS is resolution independent.

It is greyscale font rendering, yes, but it is coloring those pixels based on subpixel information.




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