Using a DE is pretty straightforward but you might be out of luck if you use something like dwm.
Find correct DPI of your display currently used by X server
xdpyinfo | grep -B2 resolution
This is probably the correct value. If not, you can calculate it by converting your screen size to inches and dividing the resolution by display length.
xrandr | grep -w connected
The above block spits your screen resolution and physical size. Now divide it by display length in inches.
Create/modify the file ~/.Xresources
and append the following line (replace 96 with your DPI)
Xft.dpi: 96
and have it processed by the startup file (like .xinitrc)
xrdb -merge ~/.Xresources