2. People who regularly adjust font size as needed.
The first group is helped by a reasonable responsive font size. The second group isn't hindered by it.
Is there really a significant group of people who carefully set their preset font size, but then do not adjust it as needed when they visit a page? It seems unlikely to me. Even if all webpages used your defaults, there’s still no one-size-fits-all preset to pick, since typeface, weight, layout, leading, colors and many other things also impact readability. The tool to take control of all of that is reader mode, which is a great option when a website has screwed up its typography.
> I would expect two large groups of user behavior:
I think you're missing:
3. People who set the font size once, when they configure their browser, to their preferred font size and expect, for some weird reason, that this will be respected!
> The tool to take control of all of that is reader mode, which is a great option when a website has screwed up its typography.
That would be great, if there wasn't a huge correlation between websites that screw up their typography, and websites that use an ungodly mess of nested `div`s and javascript-based content rendering that breaks reader mode.
No, I set it one for each device, then I never touch it again. So I'm am the third group that you doubt exists.
I don't want to fiddle with it. I read text on my phone, I have a preferred size to read, I shouldn't have to change it more than once. The few sites which end up too big or too small I read begrudgingly. Can I even set font size per site?
Pinch zoom doesn't work because now I have to pan left and right for each sentence?
All CSS font sizes are already responsive because CSS pixels are an abstract concept. Adding your own hacks on top of that instead of respecting system settings is counter-productive.
1. People who never adjust font size.
2. People who regularly adjust font size as needed.
The first group is helped by a reasonable responsive font size. The second group isn't hindered by it.
Is there really a significant group of people who carefully set their preset font size, but then do not adjust it as needed when they visit a page? It seems unlikely to me. Even if all webpages used your defaults, there’s still no one-size-fits-all preset to pick, since typeface, weight, layout, leading, colors and many other things also impact readability. The tool to take control of all of that is reader mode, which is a great option when a website has screwed up its typography.