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Anyone know the typical type sizes used in English language newspapers vs Chinese language papers. Is it true that Chinese papers use a larger type size than English newspapers?

Oh, dear, yes. Something like 16 points for Chinese, versus 8 points for English. For, of course, obvious reasons.

What are the obvious reasons?

So the reader can distinguish the details of the characters, which may be necessary to know what they mean?

But isn't the question then: are we sizing the Latin correctly within a Chinese font?
That is, we make assumptions about the relationship of the ideographs to the Latin glyphs when we draw a Chinese font containing Latin. But then if most users set the same font at different sizes for Latin and Chinese, perhaps that relationship needs to be adjusted?

Ask Keith Tam.

@jasonc It seems to me it doesn't make sense to use a Chinese font for mainly Latin text, while for Latin characters embedded in Chinese text you would follow the practice of the standard Chinese font makers. Most of those that come with OS X seem to make the Latin caps just slightly smaller than the Chinese.

The non-intuitive but central thing to remember about relative apparent size between scripts is that it should be just another factor - it should not always be equalized.

hhp

Thanks all! Super helpful.

Cheers, Si

@jasonc:
But isn't the question then: are we sizing the Latin correctly within a Chinese font?

Not really. Because while texts in English with a few Chinese characters might use different point sizes for the two, as long as you're using one font, the line spacing remains constant.

More traditional publications set body text about 11/13 - 12/14 ish while gossip rags set it to larger types.

Just keep in mind if you are going to set your type vertically, leading are tight and tracking will be loose.

As for type sizes, anything under 12pt will require specific typefaces/fonts. Since anti-alias or ink bleed will render your text hard to read or illegible.