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I've connected 27" Dell U2715H to MacBook pro 2012 and have a default resolution 2560x1440. It looks nice but the font size is waaaay too small, so I had to lose some of this niceness by scaling down to 2048x1152.

I wonder is this a usual thing people do? I know this kind of displays (27" 1440p) are popular as an external MacBook monitors. As far as I know, it's not possible to change the global font size. I can't imagine how people go along with this tiny text by default with 1440p.

UPDATE:

a good question came up in comments about what do I consider a tiny font size, it's a good point, here's how it looks (full screen snapshots):

  1. Default 2560x1440: https://i.imgur.com/HWz3N14.png
  2. Scaled down 2048x1152: https://i.imgur.com/neyt4r1.png

My eyesight isn't perfect so I asked my colleague who wears glasses to take a look at it, he confirmed that it does look tiny

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In my experience if you connect your monitor via HDMI it won't give the the font scaling options in System Preferences > Displays.

If however you connect via DisplayPort i.e. Mini DisplayPort to DisplayPort it should give you the options similar to these:

enter image description here

There used to be some hacks to trick the monitor into switching into HiDPI mode but I couldn't personally get these to work on macOS High Sierra, but using a DisplayPort cable rather than either HDMI or Mini DisplayPort to HDMI did resolve the issue.

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  • A 27" Dell U2715H isn't a HiDPI monitor, though, it's standard resolution... & really they're crisp enough to read from the other side of the room at normal settings; so the question to be asked might be "What does the OP consider normal/tiny for a font?" – Tetsujin Aug 15 '18 at 11:00
  • That's exactly how I scaled my resolution i.imgur.com/yZVWAZc.png, I guess that's the same thing as on your screenshot. I connect my display via a DisplayPort. – csandanov Aug 15 '18 at 11:03
  • @Tetsujin it's a good point, I've updated my post with snapshots for comparison. I feel how my eye strain with the default 1440p font size – csandanov Aug 15 '18 at 11:15
  • I wasn't saying that it is but the HiDPI feature lets you scale the UI and font. – unknowndomain Aug 15 '18 at 11:18

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