The best font to use for a cover letter in US hiring is a standard system typeface— Calibri or Arial at 11–12 pt for most roles, or Garamond / Times New Roman when you want a more formal tone. Workday and Greenhouse do not grade fonts, but they need selectable text; decorative faces often fail that test.
This guide is about which typeface to choose, not point size alone. For sizing, margins, and line spacing, pair it with HireFlow's cover letter font size guide .
Key Takeaways
- Prefer Calibri, Arial, Garamond, or Times New Roman
- Match the same family on resume and cover letter
- Skip script, icon, and heavy display fonts
- Export text-based PDF or DOCX for Workday and Greenhouse
- One family plus bold for your name is enough hierarchy
Best fonts to use for a cover letter
Recruiters skim letters on laptops and phones. Familiar fonts reduce friction. Unusual fonts signal design effort that rarely helps in corporate ATS workflows.
| Font | Best for | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Calibri | Most US corporate roles | Default in Word; clean on screen |
| Arial | Tech, ops, customer roles | Universal; safe across OS |
| Garamond | Law, academia-adjacent, formal brands | Elegant; keep 11–12 pt |
| Times New Roman | Conservative and some gov-adjacent apps | Classic; can feel dated at startups |
| Georgia | Readable serif alternative | Fine if resume matches |
Cambria and Helvetica are also acceptable when they already appear on your resume. The rule is consistency, not hunting for a rare typeface.
If your Word default is Calibri Light, switch to regular Calibri. Light weights can look washed out when printed or when Greenhouse renders a preview thumbnail.
Key Takeaway: Pick one boring, ubiquitous font and use it on the whole letter.
Fonts to avoid on cover letters
Script and calligraphy fonts break name parsing and look unprofessional in most US corporate inboxes.
Display fonts designed for posters (Impact, Cooper Black, novelty packs) scream template and reduce trust.
Icon or symbol fonts used for bullets can disappear after Taleo or iCIMS convert the file, leaving empty gaps.
Narrow condensed faces save space but tire readers. If you need more room, cut copy instead of squeezing the typeface.
Custom brand fonts from Canva only work if every glyph embeds and remains selectable. When in doubt, rebuild the letter in Word with Calibri or Arial.
Key Takeaway: If a font looks decorative, it is the wrong cover letter font.
Match cover letter and resume fonts
Hiring managers often open both files in one sitting. Matching fonts makes the packet feel deliberate.
Keep the same family even if the resume uses a slightly smaller body size. A one-point difference is fine; a different typeface is not.
Align header styling too: same name treatment, same contact line order. Dates and sign-off style should follow the letter conventions in HireFlow's how to write a date on a cover letter and how to sign a cover letter posts.
Do not add a second accent font for the company name. Bold and caps (sparingly) are enough emphasis.
Key Takeaway: One font family across resume and letter beats a branded mix.
After you lock the typeface, run the matching resume through HireFlow's free ATS resume checker so Workday and Greenhouse see clean text in both documents.
Check your resume freeHow Workday, Greenhouse, and Taleo treat cover letter fonts
Most ATS tools store the cover letter as an attachment and may extract keywords for search. They do not score Calibri higher than Arial.
What fails is when the PDF is an image of styled text. Then Greenhouse cannot search the letter, and recruiters see a blurry preview.
Workday optional upload fields accept PDF or DOCX. Prefer the same export settings you used for the resume so fonts embed consistently.
Lever and iCIMS follow the same pattern: plain, embedded standard fonts survive; outlined or converted-to-curves text does not.
After upload, open the candidate preview if the portal shows one. If letters look jagged or empty, rebuild with a system font and re-export.
Key Takeaway: ATS care about selectable text, not font fashion.
Before and after font choices
| Before | After |
|---|---|
| Pacifico script for your name + Arial body | Calibri Bold name + Calibri Regular body |
| Canva display font that exports as outlines | Word Arial 11 pt, text-based PDF |
| Resume in Calibri, letter in Comic Sans | Both documents in Calibri 11–12 pt |
| Three fonts: header, body, quote callout | One font; bold for name and job title only |
Test the export: select a sentence in the PDF and paste into Notepad. If nothing pastes, the font choice failed regardless of how polished it looked.
Key Takeaway: Replace decorative mixes with one system font and verify selectable text.
Font choice by industry and channel
Finance, consulting, and law: Times New Roman or Garamond still signal seriousness. Keep the body at a readable 11–12 pt.
Tech and startups: Calibri or Arial feel neutral. Fancy serifs rarely help and can look out of place next to a product-focused resume.
Creative roles: you can show taste in a portfolio link, not in the cover letter typeface. The letter still travels through Greenhouse or Workday like any other file.
Email applications: paste a short plain-text intro in the body and attach a PDF that uses your chosen font. Do not rely on HTML email fonts matching the attachment.
Federal or contractor portals sometimes prefer Times New Roman by tradition. Follow the posting if it names a typeface; otherwise Calibri remains safe.
Key Takeaway: Match industry norms, then default to Calibri or Arial when unsure.
Cover letter font checklist
- Choose Calibri, Arial, Garamond, Times New Roman, or Georgia.
- Apply the same family to the resume.
- Set body text to 11 or 12 pt; name only slightly larger.
- Remove script, icon, and display fonts.
- Export a text-based PDF or clean DOCX.
- Select and copy text from the PDF to confirm it is real.
- Upload to Workday or Greenhouse and check the preview.
Indentation and paragraph spacing matter after you pick the font—see whether to indent paragraphs in a cover letter .
Key Takeaway: Font choice is a two-minute decision; export testing is the real quality gate.
Word and Google Docs font settings that help
In Word, set the Normal style to your chosen font before you write. That prevents accidental mixes when you paste from LinkedIn or ChatGPT.
In Google Docs, File → Download → PDF usually preserves Calibri and Arial. Avoid "Print to PDF" from a browser print dialog that rasterizes the page.
Turn off automatic fancy ligatures if a portal preview looks broken. Standard spacing is more reliable across ATS viewers.
Embed fonts when Word offers the option for PDF export, especially if you used Garamond on a machine where the recruiter might lack the face.
Never place the letter body inside text boxes or shapes just to position it. Those containers confuse Taleo and Lever extraction even when the font is Calibri.
Key Takeaway: Set Normal style once, then write—do not format font line by line.
Pairing the right cover letter font with size and spacing
Typeface choice and point size are related but not identical. Calibri at 10 pt can feel tighter than Arial at 11 pt even when both are "safe" fonts.
For most US letters, lock the family first, then set body text to 11 or 12 pt with single or 1.15 line spacing. Your name can sit at 14–16 pt in the same family.
Garamond often needs 12 pt to match the visual weight of Calibri 11. If the letter looks sparse, increase size slightly before you add filler sentences.
Keep margins near one inch. Shrinking margins to fit a decorative font is a worse trade than cutting one proof paragraph.
After you settle size, re-export and re-test selectable text. Some PDF printers subset fonts incorrectly when you change size late in the draft.
Key Takeaway: Choose the font, then tune size—do not fix crowding with a fancy typeface.
How recruiters scan cover letter fonts on phones
Many first reads happen on a phone preview inside Greenhouse or an email client. Thin display fonts that looked elegant on a 27-inch monitor become hard to read.
Calibri and Arial hold up on small screens. Times New Roman is readable but can feel dense when line length wraps poorly on mobile.
If you must use a serif for a conservative brand, keep paragraphs short—three to four lines—so phone readers can pause between ideas.
Dark gray text on white is fine. Light gray body text in a stylish template fails accessibility and looks washed out in Workday previews.
Never set the letter in all caps for "impact." Caps plus a narrow font is a common template mistake that exhausts recruiters.
Key Takeaway: Optimize for phone preview first; desktop polish second.
Next step for your applications
Lock a safe font, then check the matching resume for ATS issues—or get a human rewrite from $29.
Frequently asked questions
Calibri or Arial at 11–12 pt are the safest default for US corporate applications. Garamond and Times New Roman also work when you want a slightly more formal look, as long as the PDF keeps selectable text.
Yes. Use the same family and similar size so the packet looks intentional when a recruiter opens both files. Mismatched fonts look unfinished even when each file is readable alone.
Yes for conservative industries and many government-adjacent roles. For startups and product companies, Calibri or Arial usually feel more current while remaining ATS-safe.
Workday, Greenhouse, Taleo, and Lever care more about selectable text than typeface fashion. Script, decorative, and icon fonts often embed poorly and can turn letters into images that parsers skip.
Use 11 or 12 pt for body text and keep the name header only slightly larger. Size is a separate decision from typeface—see HireFlow's cover letter font-size guide for spacing details.
Only if you export a text-based PDF and the glyphs remain selectable. Many template fonts look polished on screen but fail when Greenhouse or iCIMS extracts the letter for the candidate profile.
No. One family for the whole letter is cleaner. Bold and slightly larger size are enough for your name; a second display font adds risk without helping recruiters.