Design seems like such a simple, elementary thing when you think about it, but hordes of people keep getting the basics wrong, often with hilarious and side-splitting results. Buildings are hard to design, as are other objects, but we usually take the layout of sentences and phrases for granted, as though everyone will be able to understand us no matter how.we.words.our.place.

Well, the truth is, designing text so it’s readable isn’t as easy as you’d expect. There’s a system to it. There are processes that must be followed. Rules that ought never be broken. Except that those rules are broken all the time by some oblivious people. Bored Panda collected some of the best examples of incredibly bad text design that is wonderfully enjoyable to make fun of. So upvote the best/worst fails, see if your friends can figure out what’s actually written, and let us know in the comments if you’ve seen design fails that compare to these ones.

We know how much you enjoy design fails, so you can read Bored Panda’s previous posts about them here, here, here, here, and here.

#1 How Do I Apply?

Image credits: sevenonesicks

#2 Noted

Image credits: jhoang0730

#3 Apparently Scary Jesus Is A Thing

Image credits: Bausdria

One of the online communities where similar text design fails are shared daily is the subreddit ‘Don’t Dead Open Inside,’ which prides itself on collecting the most egregious examples of signs and media that don’t make any sense if you read them normally. The community, which was established in May 2014, is large, having grown to over 513,000 members.

Bored Panda reached out to the ‘Don’t Dead Open Inside’ subreddit moderators. According to one of them, the community was inspired to form because of the ‘Don’t Dead Open Inside’ frame from the very first episode of the hit TV show The Walking Dead.

According to one moderator, people make mistakes while designing text because “they’re either not thinking or they want to be original. Our main mission statement is to show them that they are wrong.”

They also had advice for those individuals willing to step up their game design-wise: “People in the west read left to right, then top to bottom. Do not “liven up” your text by making it “quirky”. Hard to read means lost attention which translates to lost revenue.”

#4 Five Extremely Slow Children Playing

Image credits: chunkledom

#5 This Terribly Worded Sign I Saw Today. Sorry, I’ll Pick Up My Dog’s Poop… Wouldn’t Want To Ruin Your Child Eating Experience

Image credits: KevenNotKevin

#6 Who Else Is Donating To End Children?

Image credits: Gummie

Canva has some handy tips for those of you willing to up your design game when it comes to words. For example, Canva suggests that you limit the number of fonts that you use and use simple ones, rather than complex ones that might not mesh together well.

#7 Thanks For The Advice

Image credits: zapsquad

#8 If You Were In A Car, Would You Know What Accident To Do?

Image credits: MrGrampton

#9 Please Do Not Take It Home. Leave Litter Here

Image credits: freshcheezels

Spacing, something most of us rarely think about, is also important and can bring about radically different effects simply by eliminating the negative space between letters, words, and sentences.

#10 No Safety. Smoking First

#11 Do I Push?

Image credits: Jean_Putt

#12 So My Campus Had A Suicide Awareness And Prevention Day

Image credits: KBid-1998

Meanwhile, colors are equally important: use them to your advantage to create harmony between different parts of the text. Use contrasting and complementary colors. Lines can be used to guide the reader’s attention and create symmetry; however, badly used lines can turn a sign or a design into a catastrophe. Think you’ve got all that? Good. Let us know how you’d fix the text designs in this list.

#13 Experience

Image credits: lilyber

#14 The Design School I Graduated From Sent This Postcard Out

Image credits: edrini

#15 This New Wall Art In My Office

Image credits: Bitemarkz

#16 Well, Uh… I Guess That’s A Good Motto

Image credits: doubletheaction

#17 This Habitat For Humanity Van

Image credits: EasterChimp

#18 Attention

Image credits: rosco555555

#19 Don’t Save A Life. Be Afraid To Give Blood

Image credits: youllneverfindmeman

#20 I Only Saw The Left Window At First And Got Very Confused

Image credits: generationfire

#21 Just Purchased This Low Quality Fried Chicken At The Grocery Store

Image credits: mountainsofkong

#22 Hood On vs. Hood Off

Image credits: m_delacour

#23 7 Surprising Black Ways To Use Beans

Image credits: maximum_chungus

#24 Smash Immigrants Welcome Racism

Image credits: Dbanzai

#25 If You Hard, Then You Hard

Image credits: Vengedpotty

#26 So I Fart Old Dust

Image credits: variousbirds

#27 Truly Inspiring

Image credits: littlefisch2020

#28 Our To Help Trollies You Move

Image credits: INTP36

#29 Book Don’t By Judge It’s A Cover At My High School

Image credits: GotSpawnKilled

#30 Burn Increase

Image credits: SabertoothCSGO

#31 Honey, I Think We’re Supposed To Turn Right

Image credits: Lolawolf

#32 They Are, In Fact, A Particular Sub-Species Of Rock

Image credits: 192747585939

#33 Wet Private Clay Parties

Image credits: bouncingredgrape

#34 From Afar, This Sign Has A Completely Different Meaning

Image credits: tannerclary3

#35 This Sign At My International School

Image credits: InboundBark49

#36 Never Ever Ever Beef. Frozen Always

Image credits: ManWitoutSocks

#37 I Think The Real Question Is: Why On A Toilet Seat?

Image credits: JaseAndrews

#38 When Your Gym Tryies Hard To Motivate You But Fails To Make Any Sense

Image credits: james_pawned

#39 Baby Needs Beers & Wines

#40 Dip Dip

Image credits: JimMorrisonsPetFrog

#41 Friend Of A Friend Got A New Tattoo

Image credits: drewwhis

#42 What Do?

Image credits: MathematicalDessert

#43 Popped Up On My Feed

Image credits: CLONE_1

#44 Stand Hong With Kong

Image credits: pedrojalapa

#45 Sorry Guys, You Can’t Let Your Pets Cook Bicycles Here

Image credits: PikachuIce

#46 This Won The Design Competition

Image credits: chica420

#47 They Must Have Added The Arrows After Realising How Steamy It Was Originally

Image credits: joe_copp

#48 Don’t Worry You’ll About It Be Ok

Image credits: pepperonilegs

#49 What Does What What Does?

Image credits: taeppa

#50 Nono Paingain

Image credits: JoJoSteelBallRun

#51 This Monstrosity

Image credits: Hantook

#52 Vicious Inc… What?!

Image credits: thedirtyjackal

#53 Either Way This Makes No Sense

Image credits: LennonForPresident

#54 Ate At A Local Restaurant

Image credits: Nopeasuoli

#55 Men Because Women

Image credits: verianne

#56 Sorry, We Don’t Over $20 Bills Accept

Image credits: TheDragon-Hunter

#57 Shosple Colupis

Image credits: caiia_

#58 I Give Up

Image credits: TheCunningLinguist89

#59 If U Stay, Go, Stay Do It 4ever Today

Image credits: childishsulvino

#60 Do Not Take And Put Blue Chairs Them Onto Gym Floor! Away When Done

Image credits: sumptinmagic

#61 I Live In Tootrno

Image credits: NairodI

#62 Get Good News One Buy

Image credits: thenickandrew

#63 Wewclmloe

Image credits: Loakattack

#64 Hard Do Hat Not Area Enter

#65 S3adlaey

Image credits: goodybags18

#66 Karaoke Thursday Here Every Sunday

Image credits: Ardinno

#67 Fire Keep Door Shut

Image credits: rwane94

#68 Wales Prince Of Hotel

Image credits: Knifty_

#69 70,000 Can’t Be Teeth, Wrong

Image credits: PivotalFugur

#70 You Had Meat “Hello”

Image credits: Baudin82

#71 It’s Supposed To Be A Quote From The Hamilton Musical. I Can See Life And Liberty But That’s All I’ve Made Sense Of

Image credits: 2meanbrothers

#72 Aloha, Please Remove Your Hawaii

Image credits: loliday

#73 This Sign I Saw While Visiting Vancouver

Image credits: aegisventus

#74 New Paint On The Wall At My Gym

Image credits: krbdy_1

#75 My Hometown Parade. Dear God

Image credits: Farnhza

#76 Please Sick Please Donate Kids Donate

Image credits: fuuuuuckendoobs

#77 I’m Call Pregnant Me

Image credits: QuinnJet

#78 Why Did I Name My Show “The Joel With Mchale Joel Show Mchale”?

Image credits: NinjaCowReddit

#79 I Am Dond

Image credits: bestgrandson

#80 Stop Refreshing

Image credits: Astro2k

#81 Who Thought This Was Acceptable

Image credits: juanprada

#82 Hear That Noise? We Are Growing. We Can Fix It Again. Apply Inside

Image credits: armchairnixon

#83 Real Trucks Not Carry Loads, Handbags

Image credits: HitlersOneInchDick

#84 Did Hurt My Your Back Knife?

Image credits: schjkel

#85 Carop Washen

Image credits: ArtBudy

#86 Trust Onoe

Image credits: Emil8ner

#87 I Drink Game And Of I Loans Interest Is Coming Know Things

Image credits: Gold_Paperclip

#88 Auitsumn

Image credits: Juppixon

#89 Found At A Local Bar

Image credits: jughandle

#90 Just Stop

Image credits: MartinsHMMMM

#91 Always Bright Look On Side The Of Life

Image credits: peppermint_jake

#92 This Sign I Saw In Someone’s Yard

Image credits: CallingFrom127001

#93 Babies What Drink Are Milk You

Image credits: CharlieEdjmin

#94 How To Give Someone A Seizure

Image credits: _pm_me_a_CAT_

#95 Teachers Who Love Teach Children Teaching To Love Learning

Image credits: quinky_bee

#96 Saw This In A Store Today

Image credits: carpelas13

#97 Lsatnyglueaigne Lsatnyglueaigne

Image credits: inktrails

#98 There Isis There. More! More?

Image credits: cooch_vandercorn

#99 Power Bur To The Ger

Image credits: rflil

#100 *inhales* Everything Everything Everything Everything Everything Everything Everything

Image credits: Vampyrix25

#101 Saw This At Work Today

Image credits: rdeddit

#102 No Know Jesus Jesus

Image credits: Spooksandgiggles

#103 My Eyes Just Died

Image credits: Trepach

#104 Catc H So Mes Tard Ust

Image credits: ImpishAlice

#105 Always Forgotten – Missed Never

Image credits: cdsackett

#106 I Would Like A Free Donation. Also, Here’s My Lemonade

Image credits: BossMabel5

#107 Jesus Are Is Coming You Back Ready?

Image credits: porkstick

#108 Tread Though Our What Softly Leaves Words Can Because

Image credits: JordanEBailey2

Source: boredpanda.com