# Impact Impact is a sans-serif typeface designed by Geoffrey Lee in 1965 that became the default font for image macros after Microsoft bundled it with Windows 98. Something Awful user FancyCat captioned the 2003 Happy Cat picture with 'I Can Has Cheezburger' in Impact, and by the Advice Animals era meme generator sites like Cheezburger and Quickmeme set it as their default caption typeface. ## Origin Geoffrey Lee designed Impact in 1965 for the Stephenson Blake foundry in Sheffield, hand-cutting each letter in metal before selling the typeface to the foundry[1]. Stephenson Blake's own marketing materials from the period already showed Impact placed over photographs, because the heavy letters stayed readable even without a black outline[1]. In 1996, Microsoft licensed Impact as one of its Core fonts for the Web and shipped it with Windows 98, which at the time held more than 90% of the PC operating system market[2]. That bundle, along with the freeware MS Paint, put the typeface on tens of millions of desktops at the exact moment early forum users started captioning pictures[2]. - **Platform:** Stephenson Blake foundry (typeface), Something Awful (meme usage) - **Creator:** Geoffrey Lee (typeface designer) - **Date:** 1965 ## Overview Impact appears in white block capitals with a thin black outline, stacked at the top and bottom of a photo in the standard image macro layout[1]. The thick strokes, high x-height and tight letter spacing keep captions legible over busy backgrounds, which is why LOLcats, FAIL, Cool Story Bro and Advice Animals all share the same visual signature[2]. The font's design brief from 1965, as Lee later described it, was to fit as much ink on the page as possible at a given point size[3]. That same density is what lets a one-line punchline read clearly on a thumbnail-sized cat photo. Posters later started making meta jokes about the typeface itself, with image macros that call out how overused Impact had become in captioning[3]. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is Impact? Impact is a condensed sans-serif typeface designed by Geoffrey Lee in 1965 and widely used for white-on-black captions in image macros[1]. ### Where did Impact come from? Lee hand-cut Impact in metal in 1965 and sold it to the Stephenson Blake foundry in Sheffield[1]. Microsoft licensed it in 1996 and shipped it with Windows 98[2]. ### What does Impact mean in meme context? In meme context, Impact refers to the thick white caption font with a black outline that sits at the top and bottom of an image macro, as seen on LOLcats and Advice Animals[2]. ### How do you use Impact? Common convention is to set the caption in white Impact with a thin black stroke, stacked across the top and bottom of a photo, as the default in generators like Cheezburger and Quickmeme[3]. ### Is Impact still popular? Impact is still the default typeface in major image macro generators and is covered in academic and press write-ups as the signature meme font[5][1]. ## References 1. [https://www.vox.com/2015/7/26/9036993/meme-font-impact]() 2. [https://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/25/tech/social-media/image-macros-memes-impact-font/]() 3. [https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/impact]() 4. [https://diaryofdennis.com/2013/05/10/the-most-commonly-used-meme-font-and-a-tutorial-how-to-create-a-meme-with-photoshop/]() 5. [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1470412914544515]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/impact Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library