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Creative Tim

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25+ Best Free Fonts for Websites in 2023 (Font Tips Included)

Welcome to the world of web design, where typography plays a crucial role in shaping the digital landscape! As we step into 2023, the ever-evolving nature of web design continues to push boundaries, making it essential for designers to stay updated with the latest trends and tools. When creating visually stunning and engaging websites, selecting the right font is more critical than ever.

In this article, we present to you a curated collection of the best free website fonts, accompanied by invaluable font tips and insights. We understand that choosing the perfect font can be a daunting task, given the vast array of options available. That's why our expert team has scoured the web to handpick a selection of remarkable fonts that strike the perfect balance between aesthetics, readability, and uniqueness.

Join us on this typography journey as we uncover the fonts that are shaping the web design landscape in 2023. Get ready to transform your websites into masterpieces that leave a lasting impression on your visitors. Let's dive in!

What Do You Know About Fonts?

But first, let’s refresh your font knowledge a bit!

Elements of Typography

Typography, as an essential aspect of visual communication, comprises several elements that collectively shape the appearance and impact of text. Each element plays a unique role in enhancing readability, conveying emotions, and creating a memorable visual experience.

Here is a list of the critical elements of typography:

  • Typeface: A typeface is a specific design or style of characters (letters, numbers, and symbols) with consistent visual characteristics. It represents a complete set of characters within a particular style.

  • Font: A font refers to a specific instance or variation of a typeface. It includes all the digital files that represent a particular typeface at a specific size, weight, and style.

  • Style: Typography offers various styles, such as italic, oblique, or underline, which enable designers to add emphasis, create contrast, or distinguish certain elements from the rest.

  • Tracking: Tracking refers to the uniform spacing between all the characters in a text. Adjusting the tracking can enhance readability and impact, especially in larger display text.

  • Kerning: Kerning is the adjustment of space between two specific characters. Proper kerning ensures that the spacing between letters feels natural and balanced, improving legibility.

  • Color: The color of the text influences the overall visual appeal and emotional response of readers. Careful color choices can evoke specific moods or highlight important information.

  • Size: The size of the typeface is crucial in determining the hierarchy of content. Larger fonts often signify headings and titles, while smaller fonts are used for body text and supporting information.

What Is Font Weight?

This is another very important typography element that needs to be mentioned. So important, in fact, that we decided to discuss it separately from the rest of the elements.

Font weight refers to the thickness or heaviness of the characters in a typeface. It is determined by adjusting the stroke width of the characters, resulting in variations like light, regular, bold, or black, each carrying a distinct visual impact and emphasis.

How To Set Your Letter Spacing

Letter spacing refers to the space between letters in text, and it plays a crucial role in improving the legibility and readability of the text.

Letter Spacing
Image Source

By default, the value of letter spacing is set to 0 when you set a font size. While it may be tempting to experiment with higher values for artistic purposes, it is important to keep in mind that overly tight or wide text can make it difficult for readers to comprehend the content. Therefore, it's recommended to keep the value of letter spacing at 0 in most cases to ensure a pleasant reading experience.

Best Font Resources

Before giving you our best website font picks, let’s take a look at what resources you can use to find the best UI fonts:

  • Google Fonts

More than 1,300 font families are available on the Google platform, including, but not limited to, handwritten fonts, monospaced designs, and sans serif variants, to mention a few.

Since everything in the Google Fonts library is open-source, it is legal to use it on any website, whether it is for personal or business usage. You can download as many fonts as you require to use in documents, mockups, or, most importantly, web design.

  • DaFont

DaFont is one of the biggest web resources for free fonts. More than 64,500 free to use designs are available for download; most are only intended for personal use, but some are also available for free commercial usage.

The database's methodical organization into categories or themes like fancy, international, holiday, gothic, and techno is DaFont's strongest feature. Additionally, choices for basic, script, and dingbats are available.

  • FontSpace

With more than 92,000 fonts in its library at the moment, FontSpace is another excellent free font online resource. By providing easily customizable quick preview tools, the website was developed with font designers in mind.

Creating an account is not required in order to download a file from FontSpace, making it very simple to use. There are numerous ways to locate fonts. The font, style, and collections are separated into menu options in the top menu. To avoid confusion, "Fonts" has two tabs: one marked "Popular" and the other "Commercial-Use." Try using "Random" as a search option if you're unsure of what to look for.

  • Fontshare

The Indian Type Foundry (ITF) offers a free fonts service called Fontshare that makes premium fonts available to everyone. With the help of this program, you may access a sizable collection of premium, totally free typefaces for both personal and professional usage that are both "Closed Source" and "Open Source." Closed Source fonts are exclusive to Fontshare and aren't available anywhere online.

How To Choose The Right Font

A lot of fonts are aesthetically pleasing, but not all of them fit with every project. It’s important to consider multiple aspects before making a decision. Here are 4 key things to keep in mind:

  • Identify the Purpose: Understand the project's context and audience to determine the tone and style required.
  • Prioritize Readability: Choose fonts that are easy to read, especially for body text.
  • Establish Hierarchy: Define a clear visual hierarchy with complementary fonts for headings and body text.
  • Consider Brand Alignment: Ensure the selected font for the website aligns with the brand's identity and values.

Cool Fonts For Your Project

Pick your favorite font below!

1. Arvo

Arvo

Arvo is a multipurpose geometric slab-serif font family that may be used in both print and digital applications. It features a well-balanced combination of mono-linear and somewhat contrasting design, boosting readability on Mac OS X. It is composed of Roman, Italic, Roman Bold, and Bold Italic cuts. The font's relevance in programming and its Estonian provenance is reflected in the name, which translates to "number, value, worth" in Finnish.

2. Exo

Exo

Exo is a modern geometric sans-serif typeface that expertly combines a feeling of the future with a tasteful design. It provides a wide variety of 9 weights, each complimented by a genuine italic variant, and was created to be versatile. Exo provides a blend of style and readability and is appropriate for display and varying text sizes, making it perfect for a variety of applications.

3. Azeret Mono

Azeret Mono

Azeret Mono is a monospaced, mono-linear typeface that draws inspiration from OCR typefaces, futuristic operating systems, and interfaces from the 1990s. The typeface, which was created with an emphasis on operating system usability, reflects a distinct personality developed via meticulously constructed nuances, making it an adaptable and distinctive option for diverse design projects.

4. Aileron

Aileron

The Neo-Grotesque sans serif superfamily of typefaces known as Aileron was influenced by Helvetica. It is more legible than Helvetica with features like the curving lowercase l that makes uppercase I easy to discern. Circular dots and periods that follow the Euler spiral have a velvety look.

5. Ferrum

Ferrum

Ferrum is a striking and elegant display typeface, exuding a sense of industrial strength and craftsmanship. With a bold yet refined design, the font captures the essence of metallic structures and machinery, making it a perfect choice for projects seeking a powerful and sophisticated visual impact.

6. Crimson Text

Crimson Text

Crimson Text was created specifically for the creation of books, and it was inspired by exquisite old-style fonts like Garamond. It meets the need for high-quality, free fonts that include arithmetic symbols, tiny capitals, old-style figures, and fleurons. The typeface strives to provide the free type community with an attractive and functional option by drawing inspiration from well-known typographers.

7. Rubik

Rubik

Philipp Hubert and Sebastian Fischer of Hubert & Fischer designed the sans-serif font family Rubik for the Chrome Cube Lab project. It has softened edges. There are 5 weights in total, including Italic and Roman styles, as well as Rubik Mono One, a monospaced version of the strong Roman design.

8. Courier Prime

Courier Prime
The 1956 original of IBM's Courier, created by Howard Kettler, is now known as Courier Prime. This monospaced font family, which is intended for screenwriting, shows greater elegance than its predecessor. A more refined and better typographic experience is delivered by the sharper, less curved serifs, larger counters, darker bold weight, and more cursive italics.

9. Anek Devanagari

Anek Devanagari

Anek is a flexible typeface family that includes many scripts in a range of weights and widths and was created cooperatively by several designers. It provides an informed and novel perspective that is grounded in Indian letter traditions. Anek's design space enables it to adapt to a variety of applications, from small and textured to large and expressive. This font family is perfect for appealing headlines and captivating word marks since it has 10 scripts, a common design, and distinct cultural inspirations.

10. Work Sans

Work Sans
Work Sans was influenced by early Grotesque designs like Miller & Richard and Stephenson Blake. With the Regular weight and medium weights suited for text sizes (14px–48px) and the extreme weights for display, it is suitable for both on-screen and print usage. The design prioritizes screen quality and uses diacritical signs that have been expanded and simplified. On the Work Sans GitHub project website, you can get a version that is designed for desktop applications.

11. Fira Sans

Fira Sans
The Fira font family was created expressly to enhance the personality of Mozilla FirefoxOS while providing outstanding legibility on a variety of smartphone devices. In order to accommodate different screen characteristics, it offers three widths with appropriate italic styles. The package also provides a Mono Spaced form for increased adaptability in various applications.

12. Outfit

Outfit
The Outfit Typeface, a gorgeous geometric sans font inspired by the brand's ligature-rich word mark, is the official typeface for Outfit.io. The font serves as the foundation of brand automation by seamlessly tying Outfit's written voice to its product markings, guaranteeing consistent messaging throughout. The identity and mission of Outfit.io are nicely captured by this adaptable and lovely typeface.

13. Public Sans

Public Sans
Public Sans, developed by the United States Web Design System, draws inspiration from Libre Franklin to create a robust and neutral typeface suitable for interfaces, text, and headings. Its strength lies in its versatility, making it an ideal choice for various design applications across web interfaces and content.

14. Be Vietnam Pro

Be Vietnam Pro
Be Vietnam Pro is a modern Neo Grotesk font tailored for tech companies and startups. This typeface stands out for its refined Vietnamese letterforms, featuring adaptive diacritics forms designed to enhance readability. Ideal for various design applications, Be Vietnam Pro perfectly complements the branding and communication needs of technology-focused ventures.

15. Manrope

Manrope
Manrope is a contemporary open-source sans-serif font family, initially designed by Mikhail Sharanda in 2018. In 2019, with collaborative efforts from Mirko Velimirovic, Manrope was transformed into a variable font, offering enhanced versatility and adaptability for a wide range of design projects.

16. PT Sans

PT Sans
To enable Russians to read and write in their mother tongues, the "Public Types of Russian Federation" initiative produced the open-source PT Sans font family. PT Sans and PT Serif, which are available under a libre license and with funding from the Russian Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications, honor Peter the Great's development of civil type and feature characters from a number of Russian languages.

17. Raleway

Raleway
Designed by Matt McInerney as a single thin weight, Raleway is a classy sans-serif typeface family. In 2016, a full revision and italics were added. It is adaptable and provides ligatures, diacritics, old style, and line numbers, as well as a stylish alternative with geometric influences.

18. Merriweather

Merriweather
With a large x-height, somewhat condensed letterforms, modest diagonal stress, robust serifs, and open structures, Merriweather is a text face designed for screen readability. Additionally, Merriweather Sans, a companion sans-serif family that matches the serif family's weights and styles, completes design efforts by guaranteeing harmonic typographic continuity.

19. Montserrat

Montserrat

In order to preserve the rapidly disappearing urban typography of the early 20th century, Julieta Ulanovsky drew inspiration from the old posters and signs in the Montserrat area of Buenos Aires while designing the Montserrat typeface. The regular family has two sister families: Subrayada, which celebrates emphasized styles included in the typography of the Montserrat area, and Alternates, which features distinctive letterforms.

20. Poppins

Poppins
Poppins is a contemporary geometric sans-serif typeface with support for Devanagari and Latin that offers an internationalist perspective on the style. It has built Latin glyphs and is the first multiweight Devanagari design ever. Poppins achieves a pleasing typographic balance thanks to virtually mono-linear letterforms and equal character heights.

21. Roboto

Roboto
Roboto is a font that combines mechanical and geometric elements in an unusual way and has open, inviting curves. It retains a natural letter width and rhythm, unlike other grotesks, giving reading a more humanist and serif-like feel. This dual nature creates a balanced and unified design by fusing precise structure with accessible aesthetics.

22. Open Sans

Open Sans

Steve Matteson, the type director at Ascender Corp., created the humanist sans-serif typeface Open Sans, which has a full 897-character set that includes ISO Latin 1, Latin CE, Greek, and Cyrillic. It excels in legibility and readability, is perfect for print, online, and mobile interfaces, and has an upright stress, open shapes, and a neutral yet welcoming style.

23. Bebas Neue

Bebas Neue

Ryoichi Tsunekawa's Bebas Neue display typeface family is ideal for headlines, captions, and packaging. It expands on the original Bebas typeface and provides OpenType capabilities, making it a fantastic option for professional users looking for adaptability and customization in their projects.

24. Inter

Inter
Inter, a meticulously developed collection of changeable fonts, is designed for the best readability on computer displays. Its big x-height makes mixed-case and lower-case text easier to read. Inter provides contextual alternatives, slashed zero for distinguishing "0" from "o," tabular numerals, and more in addition to various OpenType capabilities, offering a flexible and sophisticated typographic experience.

25. Lato

Lato

The Polish word for "summer" is Lato, also the name of a sans-serif font family created by Lukasz Dziedzic in 2010. Lukasz created a "transparent" yet distinctive typeface that is appropriate for body text and higher sizes by juggling competing goals. Lato emanates timeless elegance while emulating classical proportions and a modern sans-serif appearance. It maintains its distinctive personality despite not following modern trends.

26. Great Vibes

Great Vibes
Great Vibes is a sophisticated script typeface that elegantly blends professional lowercase shapes with flowing, informal uppercase letters. It has alternative characters and slick ligatures with more than 400 glyphs. Great Vibes guarantees flexible and seamless typographic expression with complete Latin character sets and support for Western, Central, and Vietnamese languages.

27. EB Garamond

EB Garamond
The popular humanist types from the middle of the 16th century by Claude Garamont have been revived as EB Garamond. It faithfully recreates the original design and is modeled around Conrad Berner's "Berner specimen," which features various sizes of the Roman and italic typefaces from Garamont and Granjon. Garamond has a long history and has influenced many type designers, leading to various revivals.

Implement Your Chosen Font In Your UI/UX Design

You know what fonts are, where to find them, and how to choose them. You’ve looked through a carefully made selection of popular typefaces. Now, all that’s left is for you to make your choice and start implementing it in your web design.

Picking the best free fonts is not the only thing we excel at. We also offer a UI/UX Design Book for your website and mobile app development. If you want to learn more about all the UI/UX design components, not just fonts, then be sure to check it out!

Top comments (4)

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groovemen profile image
Stefan

Absolutely agree! Typography is often underestimated in web design, but it truly has the power to transform a website's aesthetics and user experience.
This article's insights serve as a valuable compass for navigating the ever-evolving design landscape.
Kudos to the author for shedding light on this essential aspect of web design!

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marqbeniamin profile image
Beniamin Marcu

This article provides valuable insights into the world of web design, emphasizing the pivotal role typography plays in shaping the digital landscape. In the dynamic field of web design, staying current with the latest trends and tools is essential, and 2023 is no exception. As we navigate this ever-evolving terrain, the article's focus on selecting the perfect fonts for creating visually captivating and engaging websites is a timely reminder of the importance of attention to detail in design. A must-read for designers looking to make a lasting impact in the digital sphere!

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fontedeletrasionl profile image
Cesar Sipes

Those 26 typefaces are quite attractive to me personally. There are also many other font styles I find attractive fontesdeletras.io/nl/

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andrewhoosier profile image
AndrewHoosier

Thank you so much for sharing this post! There are some good insights.