Top 100 Best Fonts for Graphic Designers (2021)

199 thoughts on “Top 100 Best Fonts for Graphic Designers (2021)”

1. What, no comic sans 🙂

   Also surprised Century Gothic isn’t on there.

2. I love this post

3. Thanks so much for including the designer and especially the year the font was created – always good to put the historical context around a font, and amazing that #2 on the list is based on a design that’s almost 500 years old.

4. No Trebuchet? </3

5. Okay, I was a bit hasty there.

   “Free fonts or operating system fonts were not considered, nor were fonts integral to standard software (i.e. Arial, Verdana, etc.).”

   I think Trebuchet falls in there. As does Century Gothic, I presume.

6. great list, except one thing: no Centaur. Screw Trebuchet. no Centaur. Can’t please us all, eh? 😉

7. I have to agree that that is a good list. I love the fancy fonts like the ones that are often used for weddings and such. they look so nice and professional.

8. Yeah, Kabel made the list, one of my favorites. They should do a best system fonts. It might be a short list though. But if they did that article they’d have to set the entire article in Papyrus and Comic Sans. That sounds so bad it would almost be good. ALMOST.
   Great post as usual Jacob.

9. Filosofia and Mrs Eaves deserved a better position, they are simply amazing fonts.

   Thanks a lot for this great list.

10. Pingback: links for 2009-03-04 « Donghai Ma

11. I guess my slight issue with this list is that some of the top typefaces are also criticized for being the most over used, and very “un-designer”-esque. It’s somewhat of an oxymoron listing helvetica as the top font of all time, and in a similar link listing it as the most over used, and in a similar link identifying it as a font that “pseudo” designers use b/c they don’t know better. It baffles me that so many will praise this font, yet an equal amount of people will bash it. It’s the same case with other faces as well.

    pettiness aside, it’s a solid list; thanks for posting it.

12. And yet you only need 10, if you know how to use them.

13. oo.Thanks!
    Very interesting list.
    I am surprised that Century Gothic isn’t on it though

14. Century Gothic is bad font, you really need to start using Avant Garde or Avian.

    I have the PDF of this list, visually brilliant, but it’s only available in German unfortunately.

    Gotham is slowly becoming my favourite.

15. Excellent stuff!

    And thanks for the link Jacob. 🙂

16. Thanks for putting this together. Always good to see how fonts emerge, adapt, change or dissolve away from the social and design stratum.

    One Love

17. No any of M$ cleartype fonts (like segoe, calibri, consolas …)? I’m looking for a nice monospaced font to use in Intellij Idea in Linux (Jaunty). Consolas looks good in Windows, but worse than Bitstream Vera Sans Mono in Jaunty.

18. Great list, there are some fonts in the top 33 I’ve never heard of which is surprising. Also surprising that Avant Garde and Avenir aren’t in the top. Kinda sad really.

    Great list mate, I’m gonna have to collect the ones I don’t have!

19. Correction, Avant Garde is in the top.. good to see. Still.. some of these are somewhat unsettling.. Zapfino in the top 33.. OUCH

20. Thats alot of fonts to have, but like the first guy said (Kolbe) 10 fonts would be all you might need. Maybe 20 max.

21. Great list, really great, allthough not many surprises.

    However, I wish that pdf could be translated into English – if I just knew German, had it a year in school and all I can do is count to ten:)

22. Great compilation, one more time.

23. excellent article! i personally feel bad that I misuse Officina, Meta, Eurostile, and Lucida a lot.

24. Pingback: Top 100 Fonts of All Time (from Nick Vadala) « DFJ Section 002

25. Where is Georgia?

26. Pingback: floor44 - links for 2009-03-04

27. Where is Times New Roman and Arial? I can’t find #1 on my PC anywhere?

28. Copperplate at 60!?! What kind of list is this? There is only 1 font you need, copperplategothicbold.com

29. Also confused about the lack of Georgia. Probably my favorite website font. So classy.

30. Pingback: The Technology Blog: The Top 100 Best Fonts Of All Time

31. Thank you all for your comments and you’re welcome.

    Laslo, RyanC, Aetoric,
    “It is also worth noting that this evaluation consisted exclusively of licensed or commercial fonts only. Free fonts or operating system fonts were not considered, nor were fonts integral to standard software (i.e. Arial, Verdana, etc.). Font variations, which over the centuries have been individually interpreted by various Foundries, were uniquely evaluated as a class and the best variant was entered into the main judging process.”

32. Pingback: Daily Links | AndySowards.com :: Professional Web Design, Development, Programming, Hacks, Downloads, Math and being a Web 2.0 Hipster?
33. Pingback: links for 2009-03-05 | This Inspires Me

34. I’ve used eurostile for years!

35. I started work in the Print industry when we used the term “hot metal”. I was a Compositor picking up metal letters from a Case and setting them into lines of type in a Typestick. Most memorable typefaces at that time were Helvetica, Times, Gill, Plantin and Palace Script.

    By the time I had completed my 6 year Apprenticeship, I could recognise and name just about every typeface in existance at that time. We had to, it was one of the important and necessary qualifications of the job.

    All the best, from a not too old a person,
    Steve.

36. Pingback: Las 100 mejores fuentes de la historia | rienzie - Internet, tecnología, informática y curiosidades

37. It’s interesting to see where each font falls in order, would not have expected a couple listed in the top 10.. but there they were!
    Jacob, great job on listing the years of when the font was created.. and the name of the person who was responsible for the font.

38. Glad to see Helvetica in spot #1

39. It would be interesting to see how this list would change if you factored in the font “sales” that come with every operating system. Comic Sans, Times New Roman and Courier would have definitely made the list.

40. Pingback: Haftan?n Derlemesi - 19 | Hasan Yalç?n
41. Pingback: InkArcade - Free Webmaster Resources

42. Great list !

43. Pingback: ¿Las 100 mejores fuentes de la historia?  | Isopixel
44. Pingback: SOB Business Cafe 03-06-09 - Liz Strauss at Successful Blog - Thinking, writing, business ideas … You’re only a stranger once.
45. Pingback: Helvetica Wins Again… « Design for Journalists

46. Bodoni 1970?
    The right date is 1790, of course.

47. Pingback: an Record - Top 100 Best, Cool, Most Popular Professional Fonts (In English)
48. Pingback: Las 100 mejores fuentes tipográficas de la historia
49. Pingback: Skelton Media » 100 Greatest Fonts

50. Yeah, I don’t agree with this list.

51. Pingback: ¿Las 100 mejores fuentes de la historia? | dominios, diseño web, ecommerce - Mantis Technology Solutions Blog

52. This list is HIGHLY debateable. Why? Because there are a TON of fonts out there that are made for specific things, such as design elements in any given graphic design, such as Bokonon and Final Lap, but I don’t hear anyone saying anything about those fonts. This list is EXTREMELY subjective, because it all has to do with what you’re using the typeface for. If it’s for use as copy for the body of a page layout, then yeah, Helvetica, Arial, and so on are good fonts to use, but if you want to use a font as a design element, then you’d need a font that has the right look, if you know what I mean.

53. This is a great list that they have compiled and for commercial fonts I think it has a large number of ones I would of choosen as well as a few new ones to investigate.

    I did one of my daily “typography is everything” series based on the top 4:
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/3333022851/

54. Pingback: Weekly Links | Shaun Preston

55. Vincent,
    I have viewed my site on many, many computers and have never seen that problem of which you have told me about. Is it only on your computer that this happens?

    And helvetica works for body text in my opinion, very easy to read and great looking!

    GraphicArtist,
    I do realise that something like this is highly debatable, and it’s not going to please all but none the less, it is still a valuable resource.

    Simon,
    Thanks for your link to your typography series, quite interesting.

56. Pingback: Ana Tasarim » Blog Archive » Haftan?n Derlemesi - 19

57. I like helvetica, but if you have ever looked at your site on a Win/PC, is it hard to read. Helvetica looks terrible as body text, the letters come out all different sizes and the top line looks like a rolling wave. If you are interested, email me and I will show you a screenshot. A lot of popular blogs are hard for us Win/PC users to read and it seems that since Helvetica looks so good on a Mac or through Safari that most designers don’t realize it.

58. I thought I would share what I meant: http://twitpic.com/1vqp4

    I wish more prominent designers would spread the word that helvetica should not be used for body text 🙂

59. Pingback: Exploring the world of blogs « PharmaXL Blogs

60. Thanks for the list Jacob. Just added to Delicious…

61. Pingback: siete’s blog » ??????100?????
62. Pingback: ??????100????? - Jeff-Chen.Com

63. Thanks for the list, definate classics! Another one of my fav’s: Aperto.

64. Jacob,

    I love this post. I still struggle with fonts and this list will help.

65. Hi Jacob,
    Great list. Thanks. I’d be interested in knowing if you have any personal favourites? Keep up the great articles. Cheers!

66. Anthony,
    Well this website is set in Helvetica so that is one hint, but I also love Gill Sans, Bodoni & Rockwell as my personal favs.

67. nice list Jacob. Most of them are some of my favorite also, like Helvetica, Rockwell, Myriad, and Futura to name a few. Keep it up!

68. Pingback: Design corner #4 - The Blogs at HowStuffWorks
69. Pingback: The 100 best fonts of all time - Waavoo!

70. Hi, Jacob

    Thank you so much for for the list…..

71. Pingback: A Periodic Table of Typefaces « Design for Journalists
72. Pingback: Our Web Design Agency’s Links of the Week | The Ocean Agency
73. Pingback: Linkit 02.3. - 13.3. | Valontuoja

74. I always prefer and linke Century Gothic & Halvitica.Nice collection.

75. Pingback: Top fonts of all time | Made in Mundo
76. Pingback: Saturday Geek Links - 3/14/09 | Geeks with Tricks

77. I’m liking the list Jacob, keep up the good work.

78. Futura where are you?

79. #5….Didn’t even see it there, damn….

    Futura for the win.

80. Pingback: links for 2009-03-15 on studiowhiz.com

81. For anyone complaining about the lack of Arial: Arial is just a copy of Helvetica!

    http://www.ms-studio.com/articles.html

    Helvetica all the way!

82. Pingback: The Top 100 Best Fonts Of All Time | DesignerMill
83. Pingback: Arial in 90’s and now Calibri « Thoughts I want to share…
84. Pingback: Dalej to samo
85. Pingback: tüm zamanlar?n en iyi 100 yaz? fontu | Cep telefonu Laptop Diz üstü pc Donan?m

86. I love avant-garde and eurostile, thanks for this!

87. I have to agree that is a good list. All are look so nice and professional.But where is Verdana and Arial?

88. Pingback: My 10 Favourite Typefaces Of All Time | Hi, I'm Grace Smith
89. Pingback: 300+ Excelent free font colections for web designer | blogfreakz.com
90. Pingback: En iyi 100 Yaz? Tipi

91. And which ones of those are supported by default by browsers (Firefox, Chrome, and IE)

92. I find it hard to believe that Trajan … One of the most used fonts in cinema titles … is number 77 … Hows That?

93. I feel like the one designer/design student who isn’t a big fan of Helvetica…is that wrong? It’s overused by designers like Comic Sans is overused by schoolchildren, I’m frankly a bit bored of it.

    That said, it’s a brilliantly designed and versatile font, admitted. 😀

94. I guess my slight issue with this list is that some of the top typefaces are also criticized for being the most over used, and very “un-designer”-esque. It’s somewhat of an oxymoron listing helvetica as the top font of all time, and in a similar link listing it as the most over used, and in a similar link identifying it as a font that “pseudo” designers use b/c they don’t know better. It baffles me that so many will praise this font, yet an equal amount of people will bash it. It’s the same case with other faces as well.

    pettiness aside, it’s a solid list; thanks for posting it.

95. All are gorgeous typefaces

    Check my wedding fonts collection…
    Wedding Fonts

    http://www.tradebit.com/filedetail.php/7235224-gorgeous-wedding-fonts-collection-90-fonts-download

96. Nice list, other than cooper black, I hate it personally, though its ok used in the right situation but more often than not it isn’t, like the old Cooper Tire logo, just because the names are the same doesn’t mean it is the right choice.

97. Pingback: Designer’s Favourite Fonts & Why

98. This is an excellent post …
    I use HelveticaNeuveLt on Most of My Design Work

    I Love It…

    Thanks …

    🙂

99. 33 best fonts!

100. Ultimately Helvetica is in the first place ’cause is the most used font in the whole world. Definitely is very practical and clear.

     Having thousands of fonts to work with, it’s so difficult to say which one is the best (not the most beautiful), but when works comes and comes and the clients ask for changes, is easy to understand why this font is the winner. The clients wants some clear texts and us wants less changes.

     We (the designers) have other fonts that we will use in our own projects and maybe with some “Art Lover” client.

     Good post.

101. Correcting the last part of the first paragraph of my comment. “The clients wants some clear texts and we want less changes.” Thank you.

102. Hey where is monotype corsiva. That the most one of the pretty looking fonts.

103. Great list of FONTS, these are really good looking fonts for new trend websites!!! Thanks

104. Great list! My all time fav has to be Rotis collection!

105. Pingback: Top Commercial Fonts For Print Designers
106. Pingback: Corporate logo tips « *.rng = *.Sriranga Chidambara J L
107. Pingback: Corporate logo design tips « *.rng = *.Sriranga Chidambara J L
108. Pingback: Over 100+ Best Fonts on the Web for Designers | Hot Hosting
109. Pingback: Over 100+ Best Fonts on the Web for Designers | Web Hosting Blog | Lunarpages Lunartics

110. I just completed a survey based on a reasonably large sample of favorite fonts from blogs, websites, sales charts, and a lot independent discussion from blogs and forums. I tallied all the names and number of references from all these sources and came up with this combined result:

     http://bonfx.com/19-top-fonts-most-preferred-by-graphic-designers-from-around-the-web/

     All the fonts I found are, of course, on the big German list. But it was cool to see that of the top 10 font for both lists, 7 fonts overlap, but my data was purely based on the opinion of the self-reporting font-loving designers who took the time to post.

     I would gather that people for whom Comic Sans is their font of choice, they were to embarrassed to admit it online 🙂

111. Pingback: 19 top fonts most preferred by graphic designers from around the web
112. Pingback: Top 10 fonts for graphic designers
113. Pingback: Las 100 mejores fuentes de todos los tiempos | Adventure Graphics
114. Pingback: Kaffehausdekadenzmoderne » Archives » 100 Design-Related Blog Posts With Lists of 100 Things
115. Pingback: More Font Websites | Dan Murphy's Blog

116. I love the fancy fonts like the ones that are often used for weddings and such. they look so nice and professional.

117. Pingback: Roundup of Fonts Roundups at ESTHETIC CORE | blog

118. Why free fonts were not included? Just because it was not possible to estimate sales figures?

119. Pingback: Type Organization and Classifications

120. Vincent,

     Either you have a very bad clone with Helvetica posing as “Helvetica” on your system or the browser you’re using is not rendering Helv correctly.

     I have Helvetica and never have had the wavy-text problem with it when using it as body text on websites. Though I prefer to use Verdana if it’s going to be screen display text as not everyone owns a copy of Helvetica on their system.

121. Lenok,

     Exactly. What sales figures? They’re FREE fonts. Also very hard to track a history for many free fonts as often times, we don’t know where it came from and who designed it. Other considerations such as legality for commercial use and whether or not it’s a clone of an existing font, etc.

122. Pingback: Ban Comic Sans: A Discourse on Bad Type « Ready Aim Design
123. Pingback: 300+ High Quality And Most Popular Fonts For Designers To Discover In 2009 | Design Blog
124. Pingback: Jesse Bilsten » Blog Archive » Bookmarks for March 4th through March 5th
125. Pingback: Classic Fonts For Contemporary Design

126. great list.. thanks for sharing

127. Pingback: Top 100 fonts of all time

128. gooooooood

129. Thanks for the post. Well for me the best font is the Garamond, I often used it.

130. Wow… Its really amazing & helpful for everyone … its really a gift for web developers ..really inspirational stuff 🙂

131. I like Optima and Myriad, although others are great! I agree with first comment – in reality you just simply need only 10 to create many more!

     Thanks,
     Alex

132. Will we ever be free of the tyranny of Helvetica!?!? That typeface haunts me everywhere, give me Baskerville any day.

133. Pingback: optimal font. does it matter? « RandomnesS IncorporateD

134. I’m a sucker for curly fonts, like scriptina or Hallmark ones.

135. Very nice list friend! I admire Trajan and Stone

136. Pingback: Post Test Number 2 « Test

137. Thanks for sharing, very nice list..

138. and Century Gothic 🙁

139. Pingback: Apartment4

140. These are some good fonts. I work for an interactive marketing agency and we use a few of these when we do web design. We might try a few of these others. Thanks!

141. Where’s VAG Rounded?

142. Excellent stuff!

143. Pingback: The 100 Best Fonts (in a Huge Sortable Table)

144. loving the new Google Fonts too

145. Pingback: [tinabeans] beansprouts! » 100 Design-Related Blog Posts With Lists of 100 Things
146. Pingback: :: Edición e actividade editorial
147. Pingback: Inspiration :: Typography | BF Stop 2
148. Pingback: ???????????free template » 300+ High Quality And Most Popular Fonts For Designers To Discover In 2009
149. Pingback: What Goes on Your Graphic Design Style Guide | Nonprofit Marketing Guide
150. Pingback: Creating a Graphic Design Style Guide

151. Interesting list. Blur – now there’s a font I haven’t seen for a while!

152. Something like this as you have just saved me alot of time scanning textures and image..

153. Pingback: 100???????????

154. Sound my luck! I was looking same…This is a great list. As a web developer it’s very beneficial to me.

155. Pingback: Athenna Design | 8 New San Serif Fonts | athenna-design é uma Empresa de Design de Comunicação Em Foz do Iguaçu

156. I’m in year 12 and have been using these font for years in all my designing. Futura is defanitely one of my favourtires.

     Thanks for posting this up 🙂

157. Century Gothic is Microsoft’s version (copy) of Futura.

158. Excellent stuff!!! Wonderful fonts, thankful for the list Jacob. I often used this and love to struggles with this fonts. Thanks for this, cool.

159. Pingback: Font charts and collections | Typographical Skills

160. Excelent list of fonts. Thanks for sharing.

161. I wish I could download these in one package?

162. Love a bit of Impact!

163. My favorite is #26. Zapfino, I love cursive fonts. ?

164. Pingback: Typography – What Language Looks Like. | etcetera

165. Hi design colleagues!, Great news! An amazing new font project will be started with Google & font designer Natanael, IF – within 16 days from now – another 20% project funding is raised. If this project reaches its funding goal,, it will be published for free use in Google’s Web Fonts Directory and the designer will adapt a web version too. It truly is an amazing sans serif family that every designer should get his hands on. 🙂 And now you can. Check out this amazing project and donate a small (or large bit 🙂 to get your hands on this great sans serif typeface!. All project details can be found here; http://kck.st/tivQep

     Please help out the global webdesign community and all graphic designers in need of a cool font. Spread the word in your social media circles, copy/paste this message on your twitter, Facebook and Google+ and let’s raise some more money together the next 2 weeks.

     Happy designing!! Cheers, T.G. 🙂

166. Oh! Such classic fonts! You can use them everywhere- they are so organic and in the same time traditional! Thanks for the review!

167. Great list but why no to list some nice handwriting ones?

168. Pingback: 300+ High Quality And Most Popular Fonts For Designers To Discover In 2009 | Best Open Source Resources for Web Developers | Visibledev
169. Pingback: 400+ Best Free Font for all timeDesign Freebies

170. English version now online: http://www.100besttypefaces.com/

171. The original font ranking by FontShop is now available in English:
     http://www.100besttypefaces.com/

172. Pingback: Designer’s Favourite Fonts & Why | JUST™ Creative
173. Pingback: Classic Fonts For Contemporary Design | JUST™ Creative

174. What about Comic Sans? 😉

175. To say the least, ranking fonts is an obviously hard task… how does one measure aesthetic quality, the benefit of an item, its value to humanity and so fourth?

     • Hi cherish,

       we did the original ranking and here is how we did it: http://www.100besttypefaces.com/index.php?kategorie=about&artikel=Scoring%20Criteria

176. It would be great if these ‘most popular fonts’ were installed in Windows as standard, this would give web developers some future spare to design sites with these in mind.

177. Pingback: Just Creative’s 10 Most Popular Posts of 2012 | JUST™ Creative
178. Pingback: Top Type Faces | Design Media 2013

179. Great article but where is Quicksand I love that font! 🙂

180. Nice collection of fonts. I like the thesis-thesis font .

181. Thank you for presenting your points and providing this information. I have learned something about this topic

182. Pingback: Top 10 Facts About Times New Roman - Degreed Blog

183. What no Bookman Bold . . . . . . don’t have my glasses are there NO serif typestyles

184. Pingback: best website fonts 2014 | Site Directory

185. I’d add Melior and Perpetua.

186. “Today Sans [1988 – Volker K ster]” is best font for about us page.. Thanks for sharing these fonts. I wait for your next post.

187. Excellent stuff!!! Wonderful fonts, thankful for the list Jacob. I often used this and love to struggles with this fonts. Thanks for this, cool.

188. Pingback: Free Download Quadraat Font | Camgot.com - Android Apps, Tests, Blog, News

189. Hi,

     May I recommend our fonts site script. It allows you to create your own fonts site like 1001freefonts.com. You can view it at https://mfscripts.com/font-site-script/overview.html

     Kind regards,
     MFScripts

190. Thanks to sharing a very important information to us and its very helpful.It’s nice to see some interesting info in this blog.The content is so fresh with crispy information.

191. Great fonts how i can use this font in my website

192. impressive list of fonts. i really attract i can use my blog

193. Because of sharing a vital data to us and its extremely helpful.It’s decent to see some fascinating information in this blog.The substance is so new with fresh data.

194. Because of sharing a vital data to us and its exceptionally helpful.It’s decent to see some intriguing information in this blog.The substance is so new with firm data.

195. Thanks Jacob for the best of fonts to use list sharing with us. Now at least i got to know which is popular or best in market and good to use. Very informative and universal guide for user.

196. Pingback: 21 Most Used Fonts By Professional Designers – Bestperfeed.info
197. Pingback: 22 Most Used Free Fonts By Professional Designers – Bestperfeed.info

198. Wonderful fonts, thankful for this great list Jacob. Installed some in Windows7.

     Regards

Comments are closed.