Some users have reported an issue in which Safari renders some web pages with blurry fonts. When reading a document in Safari, the text blurs and only rebooting Safari seems to alleviate the problem.
Since installing the latest version of Safari, iFolks see certain websites where the body text appears to have broken sub-pixel antialiasing. To confuse matters further, this problem shows up on only certain parts of a page and not in others.
Blurry Fonts in Safari: Fix
Try emptying Safari cache more often. From your Safari menu bar click Safari > Empty Cache or the default keyboard shortcut Command + Option + E
Check your Safari > Preferences – Extensions. If you have extensions installed, turn those off, quit then relaunch Safari to test
Open System Preferences > General and make sure: Use LCD font smoothing when available is selected
Having Zoom enabled in System Preferences > Universal Access – Seeing may cause some blurring
Try a different monitor resolution. Open System Preferences > Displays and choose a different screen resolution
Run the screen calibrator from System Preferences>Displays>Color you will see a Calibrate button, press the option/alt key while clicking calibrate and you should enter the calibration screen, click the expert mode button, and then continue and follow the on-screen instructions
Disable “Universal Access” in the Safari preferences
As noted by several users, this problem can be solved by disabling Flash. This is easily accomplished with the ClickToFlash app, this handy utility allows users to–as the name implies–trigger playback of Flash content on web pages via a mouse click. It also swaps out Flash-based YouTube videos for higher-quality H.264 versions (something that can also be accomplished by joining the YouTube)
Failing ClickToFlash, you can download a Flash uninstaller to remove Adobe Flash altogether
Obsessed with tech since the early arrival of A/UX on Apple, Sudz (SK) is responsible for the original editorial direction of AppleToolBox. He is based out of Los Angeles, CA.
Sudz specializes in covering all things macOS, having reviewed dozens of OS X and macOS developments over the years.
In a former life, Sudz worked helping Fortune 100 companies with their technology and business transformation aspirations.
Unfortunately, the side effect of high resolution is many times native resolution cannot be used because it makes everything too small.
Especially in displaying fonts, so scaling is done to increase the size and that can induce blurriness or lack of sharpness with certain content.
This is why I still love my 1080p desktop monitor rather than buying a 4K monitor.
I can run my 1080p monitor at 100% native resolution with no scaling and that eliminates the possibility of some blurriness in certain content.
It is a side effect of not everything fully supporting the really high resolutions and their use of scaling. Eventually, as 4K gets more popular these issues will probably improve.
I think I just figured out how to get back to doing what you were doing after the page freezes and blurs the text. Just do a pinch gesture or the strokes to make the page smaller and it should go right away. Just did that and it cleared up instantly.
It happens to me sometimes while typing in a blog or some other text box and the text becomes blurry and then freezes that page. It only freezes that page until the blur goes away. It seems to happen on my laptop only and my fat thumbs get in the way and it seems like what is happening is that my thumbs and fingers touch the trackpad a specific way and thats what causes the issue. It is not that the page just comes up blurry but I have had that happen too.
Really bad when your almost done with a long blog and you loose all your work.
i’m not sure it’s (entirely) flash-related, but either javascript (mouseover and onclick events), or even css3 related. certain css3 transition effects can cause this to happen. it makes the subpixel-antialiasing go awry, even worse than if you had forced safari to switch its font rendering mode via css from the default subpixel-antialiasing to plain antialiasing.
go to the mac mini design page mentioned in the link above, remove and replace the base cover in the animation image of the mac mini, and watch the text links change at the bottom of the page.
Yet another post that is completely devoid of details; how do we know whether this is relating to Core Animation, the OpenGL issues as noted in a previous post, and a particular nVidia driver?
For the record I have never seen it come up when using Safari 5 so there is something going pear shaped with your setup – either hardware or software settings. Clear out all your ~/Library settings, reboot and see if the issues come back.
JohnIL says
Unfortunately, the side effect of high resolution is many times native resolution cannot be used because it makes everything too small.
Especially in displaying fonts, so scaling is done to increase the size and that can induce blurriness or lack of sharpness with certain content.
This is why I still love my 1080p desktop monitor rather than buying a 4K monitor.
I can run my 1080p monitor at 100% native resolution with no scaling and that eliminates the possibility of some blurriness in certain content.
It is a side effect of not everything fully supporting the really high resolutions and their use of scaling. Eventually, as 4K gets more popular these issues will probably improve.
Pete says
I think I just figured out how to get back to doing what you were doing after the page freezes and blurs the text. Just do a pinch gesture or the strokes to make the page smaller and it should go right away. Just did that and it cleared up instantly.
Done. Works. Try it.
Pete says
It happens to me sometimes while typing in a blog or some other text box and the text becomes blurry and then freezes that page. It only freezes that page until the blur goes away. It seems to happen on my laptop only and my fat thumbs get in the way and it seems like what is happening is that my thumbs and fingers touch the trackpad a specific way and thats what causes the issue. It is not that the page just comes up blurry but I have had that happen too.
Really bad when your almost done with a long blog and you loose all your work.
fmera says
i’m not sure it’s (entirely) flash-related, but either javascript (mouseover and onclick events), or even css3 related. certain css3 transition effects can cause this to happen. it makes the subpixel-antialiasing go awry, even worse than if you had forced safari to switch its font rendering mode via css from the default subpixel-antialiasing to plain antialiasing.
go to the mac mini design page mentioned in the link above, remove and replace the base cover in the animation image of the mac mini, and watch the text links change at the bottom of the page.
Kawaii Gardiner says
Yet another post that is completely devoid of details; how do we know whether this is relating to Core Animation, the OpenGL issues as noted in a previous post, and a particular nVidia driver?
For the record I have never seen it come up when using Safari 5 so there is something going pear shaped with your setup – either hardware or software settings. Clear out all your ~/Library settings, reboot and see if the issues come back.