Web Designer Wall
Typography

30 Free Fonts for Creative Projects

By Aigars Silkalns Updated 8 min read

The best free fonts for creative projects are open-source families you can use commercially, self-host, and tune with variable axes. The 30 below come from Google Fonts and Fontshare, and each is free for personal and commercial work. They are grouped by job, so you can pick a headline face, a text face and a code face without opening fifty tabs.

The first version of this list, from 2010, was thirty novelty display fonts from a download site. Most of them are hard to use today: they ship as a single desktop file, often with a personal-use-only licence and no web format. Everything here is built for screens, and the entries that are variable fonts are marked as such.

A page set in Fraunces for the headline, Inter for body text and JetBrains Mono for small labels
A complete type system from three free families: Fraunces, Inter and JetBrains Mono.

What makes a free font safe to use in 2027 and beyond

Before the picks, the checks that separate a good free font from a risky one:

  • Licence. Every Google Fonts family in this list is under the SIL Open Font License, which allows commercial use, embedding and self-hosting. Fontshare’s fonts are free for personal and commercial use under the ITF Free Font License. Check the licence page of each of the four Fontshare picks below before you ship it. Read the licence page of any font you take from elsewhere, because “free download” often means “free for personal use”.
  • Web format. You want WOFF2 files, ideally one variable file per style instead of a separate file for each weight.
  • Language coverage. If your audience writes in more than basic Latin, check the character set on the font’s page before you commit.
  • Active maintenance. A family that is still updated gets bug fixes, new weights and wider language support.

Sans-serifs for interfaces and body text

These are the workhorses. Pick one for text and most pages are done.

Specimen of Inter, Manrope, DM Sans, Plus Jakarta Sans, Figtree, Outfit and Sora set in the same sentence
Seven text sans-serifs at the same size, so you can compare their proportions.

1. Inter

Inter, by Rasmus Andersson, was designed for screens and is the safe default for dashboards, documentation and long reading. It is a variable font with weight and optical-size axes, so small text and large headings can each look right from one family.

2. Manrope

Manrope, by Mikhail Sharanda, sits between geometric and grotesque. It is friendlier than Inter at large sizes and still tidy in paragraphs, which makes it a good fit for product sites and portfolios.

3. DM Sans

DM Sans comes from Colophon Foundry. Low contrast and open letterforms make it feel clean and slightly warm, a natural choice for startup pages and editorial layouts that avoid looking cold.

4. Plus Jakarta Sans

Plus Jakarta Sans, drawn by Tokotype, has a geometric structure with rounded curves and a tall x-height. It gives headings personality without becoming a display face.

5. Figtree

Figtree is by Erik Kennedy, who teaches UI design. It aims at being friendly and simple, and it holds up in forms, buttons and onboarding screens where clarity matters more than style.

6. Outfit

Outfit is a geometric sans made for Smartsheet by Rodrigo Fuenzalida. Its round bowls and heavier weights work well for logos, hero headings and short labels.

7. Sora

Sora, by Jonathan Barnbrook and Julián Moncada, has wide, open proportions. It reads as technical without being cold, so it suits fintech, data and developer-tool brands.

Fontshare picks with more character

Fontshare is a free font service from the Indian Type Foundry. Its families feel more designed than most free alternatives, and it offers a hosted stylesheet or downloadable files.

Specimen of Satoshi, General Sans, Cabinet Grotesk and Clash Display
Four Fontshare families rendered from Fontshare’s own stylesheet.

8. Satoshi

Satoshi is a modernist sans that has become a favourite for agency and portfolio sites.

9. General Sans

General Sans is a neutral grotesque with a slightly tighter feel than Inter. Use it when you want a clean text face with a little more attitude.

10. Cabinet Grotesk

Cabinet Grotesk is a heavy, confident grotesque. At 800 weight it makes strong headlines, and a neutral text face underneath keeps pages calm.

11. Clash Display

Clash Display has wide, sharp letterforms built for large sizes. Keep it to headings and pair it with something quiet for text.

Display faces for headlines and posters

Display fonts do one thing: grab attention at large sizes. Use them for a few words, never for paragraphs.

Specimen of Bricolage Grotesque, Space Grotesk, Unbounded, Syne, Anybody, Bebas Neue and Big Shoulders
Seven display faces, from quirky grotesques to condensed poster type.

12. Bricolage Grotesque

Bricolage Grotesque, by Mathieu Triay, is a variable font with optical-size, width and weight axes. The quirks in the letterforms show up at display sizes and calm down at text sizes.

13. Space Grotesk

Space Grotesk, by Florian Karsten, grew out of Space Mono and keeps some of its odd shapes. It works as a headline face for tech and design brands, and it is readable enough for short blocks of text.

14. Unbounded

Unbounded is a wide, rounded variable font that is hard to ignore. It suits event pages, music and gaming brands, and oversized numbers in stats sections.

15. Syne

Syne, created by Bonjour Monde, was designed for an art centre’s identity. Its heavy weights turn extremely wide and experimental, which suits galleries and cultural sites.

16. Anybody

Anybody, by Tyler Finck, is a variable family built for expressive layouts and animation, where text can change as the user interacts. Try it when you want type itself to be the visual.

17. Bebas Neue

Bebas Neue is an all-caps condensed face by Ryoichi Tsunekawa. It remains the quick answer for posters, banners and sports-style headings.

18. Big Shoulders

Big Shoulders was created by Patric King for the City of Chicago, and it has the tall, tight proportions of signage. It handles long headlines in narrow columns well.

Serifs for editorial and long reading

Serifs add warmth and authority. They are back in favour for blogs, magazines, portfolios and brands that want to feel less like software.

Specimen of Fraunces, Playfair Display, Newsreader, Source Serif 4, Instrument Serif, Lora and Young Serif
Seven serifs, from soft and chunky to refined and high-contrast.

19. Fraunces

Fraunces is an “old-style soft-serif” from Undercase Type. It is variable, with weight, optical-size, softness and “wonk” axes, which lets one family go from calm to playful.

20. Playfair Display

Playfair Display, by Claus Eggers Sørensen, is a high-contrast transitional serif. It is made for headlines, so avoid using it for body text.

21. Newsreader

Newsreader, from Production Type, was designed for reading on screens. Its optical-size axis keeps captions and headlines equally crisp, which makes it a strong pick for articles.

22. Source Serif 4

Source Serif 4, by Frank Grießhammer for Adobe, is a robust text serif with a large character set. It pairs naturally with sans-serifs and holds up in documentation.

23. Instrument Serif

Instrument Serif, by Rodrigo Fuenzalida and Jordan Egstad, is condensed and elegant. It was made for display use and looks best large, in short, confident headlines.

24. Lora

Lora, by Cyreal, is a well-balanced serif with calligraphic roots. It is comfortable in blog posts and one of the easiest serifs to use well.

25. Young Serif

Young Serif, by Bastien Sozeau, is a heavy, old-style serif with a warm, slightly retro feel. It makes headlines for food, craft and lifestyle sites with just one weight.

Handwriting and monospace

Two small categories that earn their place in a toolkit: a touch of handwriting for personality, and monospace for code and data.

Specimen of Caveat, Dancing Script, JetBrains Mono, IBM Plex Mono and Space Mono
Two scripts for personality, then three monospaced faces set with code-like strings.

26. Caveat

Caveat, by Impallari Type, imitates quick pen writing. Use it for annotations, signatures and short callouts, not for anything long.

27. Dancing Script

Dancing Script, also by Impallari Type, is a lively casual script. It works for invitations, wedding sites and logos at large sizes.

28. JetBrains Mono

JetBrains Mono was made by JetBrains for reading code, with tall lowercase letters and clear punctuation. It is a variable font in Google Fonts.

29. IBM Plex Mono

IBM Plex Mono is the monospace member of the IBM Plex family, designed by Mike Abbink at Bold Monday. It has a slightly more formal tone than JetBrains Mono.

30. Space Mono

Space Mono, by Colophon Foundry, has a quirky retro-futurist look. It works for labels, captions and tags, where character matters more than density.

How to pair fonts without overthinking it

A reliable system uses two families, or three with a monospace for code. Give each one a job:

  1. Choose the text font first. It carries most of the page, so pick for readability. Inter, Newsreader or Source Serif 4 are all safe.
  2. Add contrast in the heading. If the text is a sans, try a serif or a characterful grotesque for headings. If the text is a serif, a clean sans for UI labels works well.
  3. Limit weights. Two or three weights are plenty. A variable font gives you more, but restraint looks better.
  4. Test with real content. Paste your actual headline and a real paragraph, then check them on a phone.

For more ideas on expressive text, see the animated text effects snippet and the CSS gradient text effect tutorial.

Add them to your site the fast, private way

You can load any Google Fonts family from Google’s servers, but self-hosting gives you control over caching and privacy and removes a third-party request. The Fontsource project packages open-source fonts for npm. When a family has a variable version, start with that package:

npm install @fontsource-variable/inter @fontsource-variable/fraunces

Import each package once in your entry file, for example import "@fontsource-variable/inter";. The CSS uses unicode-range, so browsers only download the character sets a page actually needs. Then wire the families to custom properties:

:root {
  --font-heading: "Fraunces Variable", Georgia, serif;
  --font-body: "Inter Variable", system-ui, sans-serif;
  --font-code: ui-monospace, "SF Mono", Consolas, monospace;
}

body {
  font-family: var(--font-body);
}

h1, h2, h3 {
  font-family: var(--font-heading);
  font-optical-sizing: auto;
  text-wrap: balance;
}

The default import of each package loads the weight axis only. Inter’s optical-size axis and Fraunces’ optical-size, softness and “wonk” axes are not included. To get them, import a different file from the same package:

import "@fontsource-variable/inter/opsz.css";     // weight + optical size
import "@fontsource-variable/fraunces/full.css";  // weight, optical size, softness, wonk

Fraunces also ships opsz.css, soft.css, wonk.css and standard.css if you want only some axes and smaller files. Both still register as Fraunces Variable and Inter Variable. font-optical-sizing: auto only has an effect once a file with an opsz axis is loaded, which is why the CSS above is paired with these imports. With the default import it is harmless but does nothing.

Fontsource’s variable packages register the family with a “Variable” suffix, such as Inter Variable, so use that exact name in your CSS. They also set font-display: swap, which shows fallback text immediately while the font loads. Keep a sensible system fallback in every stack, since it is what visitors see first.

If you do not use a bundler, download the WOFF2 files and write your own @font-face rule. Our guides to @font-face and font-face solutions explain how that rule works.

In WordPress block themes

Block themes register fonts in theme.json under settings.typography.fontFamilies. Each entry gets a slug, and WordPress turns it into a CSS custom property named --wp--preset--font-family--{slug}. Add a fontFace array when you bundle your own font files with the theme, as described in the theme handbook.

Where to find more

  • Google Fonts has the largest open-source library, with filters for variable fonts, script and language support.
  • Fontshare is a smaller, curated set with a hosted stylesheet and downloadable files.
  • Fontsource is the easiest way to self-host Google Fonts and other open fonts in a build.

If you want script and brush styles in more depth, our collection of handwriting, script and brush fonts goes further. For icon fonts, see how to add icon fonts to any element with CSS.

55 comments from the archive

  1. Fantastic set, was just about to go looking for a font like faith collapsing for a minimal design with an old feel.

    Thanks!

  3. Hi, I agree this set is great but explain me sth please..
    You wrote about 30 free fonts but, if we consider i.e. ALLSTAR REGULAR font from fonts2u (http://www.fonts2u.com/allstar-regular.font) there are information that:
    – it’s freeware;
    – several lines below we can find information: “Prawa osadzenia: Osadzania ograniczona (zabroniona!)” what basicly means “Including rights: including limited (forbidden!)”. How should I understand it??

    BR

  4. Embedding rights mean simply if you may embed the font for example into PDF. Majority of font designers do not edit these special font fields .. and keep default settings. Allstar font is definitely free.

  5. Really nice collection. Usually you see the one off goofy fonts, but you have some nice fonts that would work for everyday use mixed in as well. It’s well understood that Copperplate Gothic Bold is the best font, but alas it is not free. It is installed on 81% of the computers in English speaking countries though:)

  6. Ahhhhh you have a free version!!!! You are a gentleman and a scholar! A light version can be bolderized but Copperplate in any form is beautiful. You shall live a long life of happiness.

  8. Great Collection, thanks for putting the work all together and share it.

  9. OMG, The resemblance of fonts2u and dafont is more than obvious. I wonder if they are going to get away with that.

  10. Thanks so much of this Nick, it’s posts like these that feed the design community – keep up the great work!

  11. awesome set of resources! thank you for sharing this and doing the research for us all to discover. i will definitely be referencing this time to time.

    i just want to add, another excellent resource / place for typography is http://www.pilo.me – it by far is the most complete and solid font forum i have visited. you can definitely find similar resources as you have mentioned here at pilo. anyhow, give it a look if you are a type lover. i think it is invite only or it usually is at least, so good luck getting in. if you do get in, be sure to participate as i know they remove deadbeat users time to time.

    thanks again for the excellent links!

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  16. There are some good fonts in this collection. I really like the Decker and the Yanone Kaffeesatz Bold font. They have quite a high impact and think they would work well in a logo or some navigation. They are legible fonts with style. Definitely some great fonts here to consider for web design.

  18. This is cool! Thanks for sharing!
    I will definitely download Decker and Sansumi!

  19. Thank you! These are great! But the link on Buttacup goes to the file for Arista?

  21. Its great, thanks. I love the fonts you’ve mentioned here, I was so curios to find the Delicious’s font and here it is, I found it here. Thanks again.

  22. On the Fonts2u.com site it has an FAQ section where they state:

    “Freeware fonts can be used commercially or non-commercially without acquiring copyright permission as long as you will not profit from the use of the font. The author of the font will always retain the copyright, which refers to the reproduction, distribution, alteration and publication of the font. If you are unsure if you can use a font for a particular task the best action would be to contact the author and request the permission. “

  23. These are some excellent fonts. I’ll definitely be adding to my already way too darn big font collection. Thanks

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  26. These are coming in at just the perfect time … I’m about to revamp my site to make it a little more “fun, funky, & fresh.” It’s a bit blah for me at this point but that’s what happens when you put up a site in just a few days due to losing your job without and notice. Gotta love the economy. Thank goodness I’ve got great friends with lots of friend to refer to me. :P

    -m-

  27. Great post added a few of them to my font library. Ive always loved that font called “offensive”.

  28. These are some excellent fonts. I’ll definitely be adding to my already way too darn big font collection. Thanks

  29. Great collection! Though I must admit that I’m quite tired of seeing Diavlo on these lists. It’s really not that great of a font.

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  31. these are really great fonts
    thanks for your effort
    does anyone , downloads all the 30
    and can compress them and upload them .
    it would save lot of time for lots of people .
    thanks guys
    great effort

  32. i luv them dont know how to copy them but never mind!:) thankz anywayssss!x

  33. Thank you for the nice font collection. Never can have too many :)

  34. Love this collection of fonts! They range from 70s style to modern, and the color choices used to display each font in the example does each one justice. I think by supplying designers with fonts for free boosts the industry and allows variation to projects other than the typical MS Word serif and sans serif fonts. Personally I love the ROUGHTRAD and Yelly as well as the karabiner fonts, as I think each of these demonstrate where the design industry is going. SF Buttacup Lettering is a good representation of how a simple font can be used in various ways.

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  36. hey dey r just awsum i like d 1st one ………………………..

  37. These are truly outstanding fonts for creative project..I must say that this will be very useful for me.I will try for this.

    Thank you very much for such helpful post.You have done a good job for me.

  39. thanks for the recommendation of those great fonts but how do i download them? sorry for my ignorance.

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  48. Ahhh! Sweet, you included my font Champagne & Limousines in this list. We’re not worthy oh Web Designer Wall! XD Thanks so much, this has been a site that I admire and respect for … years, it is an honor!
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