Circled zero. Any real-world use cases?

Ermin Međedović
Ermin Međedović Posts: 101
in Type Design Technique & Theory

Most of my typefaces include circled numerals in the character set. I’m currently drawing them for an upcoming family and started wondering about the usefulness of a circled zero.

Has anyone encountered a real-world use case for it?

The only one that comes to mind is when a font provides only single-digit circled numerals  (①–⑨) and someone needs to compose numbers such as ①⓪, ②⓪, ③⓪, etc. by combining a circled 0 with another digit.

Curious whether there are practical applications I’m missing.

Comments

  • Ray Larabie
    Ray Larabie Posts: 1,490
    I often see them used in instruction manuals to refer to parts on a diagram. There are specialty circled numeral fonts that go up to 999999. Musicians and architects seem to be the main buyers.
  • Ermin Međedović
    Ermin Međedović Posts: 101
    edited 11:42AM
    Ray Larabie said:
    I often see them used in instruction manuals to refer to parts on a diagram. There are specialty circled numeral fonts that go up to 999999. Musicians and architects seem to be the main buyers.

    Yes, for constructed multi-digit circled numbers I use a feature with .init, .medi and .fina glyphs, so things like circled 12, 356, 1024, or longer numbers can be built automatically.

    What I’m wondering about is the simple standalone ⓪. 

  • Qwerasd
    Qwerasd Posts: 5
    edited 1:59PM
    Searching for the query

    "⓪" filetype:pdf

    on Google reveals that, at least in terms of PDFs that are visible online, the overwhelming use case for the circled digit 0 is in rating scales starting at 0, for questionnaires.

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