Q. What size font do footnotes need to be if the text is 12 pt. in an essay?
A. For student papers, Chicago style is covered in detail in Kate L. Turabian’s Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations (9th ed.). Turabian advises, “In general, use the equivalent of at least ten-point Arial or twelve-point Times New Roman for the body of the text. (Some fonts, like Arial, take up more space on a line and appear larger than other fonts at the same point size.) Footnotes or endnotes, headings, tables, and other elements might require other type sizes or fonts; check your local guidelines.” Turabian contains several illustrations of student papers and their formatting.