In typography, a superior is a reduced-size character that sits entirely above the cap height or aligns with the top of the regular text. Printers use these figures primarily for footnote references, mathematical powers, and ordinal indicators. Unlike standard superscript characters generated by scaling down a regular font, true superiors are drawn specifically to match the weight and proportions of the surrounding text.
Heard on the job
Make sure you use the true superior figures from the glyph palette for those footnotes, not just scaled-down regular numbers.
Insider tip
Rookies often fake superiors by shrinking standard text, which creates thin, spindly characters that look out of place next to the regular body copy.
Also heard as
- superscript