At first glance, the density of a notation page immediately impresses a reader about how difficult the music will be to play. Lots of ink close together is intimidating. Neatly spread out and easy-to-read notation seems more accessible. This relationship, though, is often actually at odds with the reality of the music’s difficulty. Simple music might be presented in ways that make it seem more difficult than it really is.
Which example strikes you as easier to read?
Example 1. Do This

Example 2. Don’t Do This!

At first glance, I would bet that example 1 looks easier to you. You might notice that example 2 is actually the same notes, but at double the rhythmic duration. The other differences are due to layout choices.
Here are ten tips for making your notation easier to read.
1. Omit redundant and unnecessary notation. Most of the time, you only need elements such as repeat ending brackets, measure numbers, and style/tempo indications set one time, above the top staff of a multi-instrument score. Default placement in some software is often on every staff, but this makes the page cluttered. Hide whatever isn’t necessary. Above, note that I moved the instrument names to the page header, from the default, which is in the left margin. Sure, at the left makes sense for large-ensemble scores, but when it is obvious who is playing what, you can get away with putting instrument names in the header.
2. Make sure that no notation elements touch each other. When two notation elements collide, both become illegible. It’s better not to have them there at all. Everything needs white space surrounding it. Keep a bit of space between lyric verses—half the font height, or so. Raise your repeat endings to fit chord symbols. Make sure that measure numbers aren’t touching slurs, chord symbols, clefs, and such. Similarly, make sure that there is no confusion with similar symbols such as numerals on fingerings, measure numbers, and tuplets.
3. Consider your rhythmic subdivisions and your time signature. If you are using lots of 16th notes or 32nd notes and no whole notes, you might be able to make the score more legible by doubling all the durations and then doubling the tempo. This reduces the amount of beaming, which can make the notation much friendlier. Sometimes, it really makes more sense to use 12/8 instead of 4/4 with a lot of triplets. Even 3/4 might be a better option than either of these, in some cases.
4. Reduce the general notation size. This proportionally makes the staves, notes, expressions, and so on all a bit smaller, while retaining the system margins, and thus increases white space surrounding all notation elements. In Finale, one way to do this is via Page Layout > Page Size.
5. Adjust spacing between staves and systems. This is especially important when you have elements such as lyrics, chord symbols, and repeat endings. Look for dead space on the page, and expand into it. Ideally, you should have a distance of about two staves between staves, sometimes more. Sometimes, you need to take space from between the systems and give it to the staves, or vice versa.
6. Adjust the number of measures per system. If there are lyrics and sixteenth notes, you might even have just two bars per line. Reducing this from the default can help a lot.
7. Choose clean and simple fonts. The Jazz font family and others that imitate handwritten notation are ultimately more cluttered than simpler, more classic fonts, such as Maestro. Save the handwriting ones for doing notation designs on coffee mugs and T-shirts, where the goal is to be cute rather than legible.
8. Omit corners. Angles catch the eye and thus increase clutter. You can often remove them, such as by removing the left-hand hook from a first ending bracket, or omitting boxes around measure numbers.
9. Align objects neatly. Indenting the top system margin, as in example 2, unnecessarily adds to the complexity of the page; it introduces an angle by having that system uneven with the others. Confirm that text elements are aligned neatly, logically positioned at margins or some other anchor, rather than floating freely in space, such as the composer name in example 2. Keep measure numbers at the same height. If they are slightly off alignment, or unnecessarily encroaching into another notation element’s rightful space, it is like introducing additional angles onto the page.
10. After you’ve done the preceding steps, you can fine tune with some of the notation spacing tools, such as the various utilities, the Measure tool’s beat adjustment boxes, and last resort, the Special Tools.
Generally, consider whether each notation element or design decision is really necessary, and then yank it or simplify it if it isn’t.
The goal of notation is always legibility for your reader. They will feel more comfortable with your scores if you try to make them as clear as possible, and ultimately, this can lead to better performances of your music.