Designers can expand their typographic arsenal with 24 diverse and high-quality fonts now available, suitable for various projects.
Designing is all about creating something exceptional, and typography is the silent powerhouse that makes it happen. The right font can set the tone, enhance readability, and elevate your work from ordinary to outstanding. This guide highlights 20 must-have typefaces every designer should consider adding to their collection, striking a balance between classic standbys and contemporary options.
01. Gilroy - Versatile Vibes
Gilroy, a modern sans-serif with a geometric touch, designed by Radomir Tinkov, offers exceptional versatility. Its 20 styles, with matching italics and weights ranging from Thin to Heavy, make it an ideal choice for editorial and web design, graphic design, and signage projects. Two styles are even available for free.
02. Polymath - Playful Personality
Designed by Vladimir Fedotov and Plamen Petrov, Polymath brings a grotesque category personality to the table. Offering exceptional versatility, this geometric sans font comes with three distinct optical sizes: a text version inspired by 1920s designs, a display version echoing 1970s proportions, and a standard size influenced by post-1980s geometric sans serifs. It also includes comprehensive language support and extensive alternates.
03. Helvetica Now - Up-to-Date Helvetica
Helvetica might be essential, but it wasn't designed for the digital age. Monotype painstakingly redrew every character to create Helvetica Now, ensuring it's ready to handle modern branding challenges. Helvetica Now comes in three optical sizes - Micro, Text, and Display - with weights ranging from Thin to Extra Black, all engineered for maximum legibility.
04. Aktiv Grotesk - A Modern Twist on the Classics
Designed by Bruno Maag and developed across ten years, Aktiv Grotesk is a grotesque sans typeface. Its variable font axes, support for 10 global writing systems, and extensive icon set give it a clean and minimalist look. Aktiv Grotesk was designed to be warmer than Univers and without the quirks of Helvetica. It offers an authoritative but neutral position.
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05. GT Flaire - NMs for Corporate Rigidity
Characterized by pronounced curves inspired by calligraphic penmanship, GT Flaire offers the perfect blend of seriousness and playfulness. It's available in 28 styles, with both serif and sans serif versions. The extensive customization options and language extensions make GT Flaire an ideal choice for diverse projects.
06. Case 2.0 - Familiar, Yet Contemporary
Essential for complex branding projects, Case 2.0 boasts a clear, neutral design that offers a solid foundation for individual adaptations and custom designs. Created by renowned type designers Erik Spiekermann, Anja Meiners, and Ralph du Carrois, Case 2.0 offers three optical sizes for versatility, a unicase feature, improved legibility, and real italics.
07. Financier - An Elegant Serif
Designed for the Financial Times newspaper redesign in 2014, Financier is an elegant and authoritative serif. Its aesthetic is inspired by Eric Gill's classic letterforms. Financier offers outstanding versatility, handling news and features well, both in print and online, and even on small mobile screens.
08. Nebulica - A Modern Aesthetic
Nebulica is a display font that combines geometric and monospace design elements for a distinctly modern aesthetic. Its experimental details, like ink traps and slanted stems, maintain visual consistency and legibility across diverse applications. Its variable font format, extensive OpenType features, and language support for over 88 languages make Nebulica an exciting choice for designers.
09. GT Sectra - Modern Blackletter Inspiration
Serif font GT Sectra was designed in 2013 as a response to Blackletter. Its creators aimed to translate those ideas in a contemporary design. The font offers three subfamilies: GT Sectra, GT Sectra Fine, and GT Sectra Display, combining the calligraphy of the broad nib pen with the sharpness of the scalpel knife.
10. Chalet Compriméé - Stylized Charm
Inspired by celebrated French fashion designer René Chalet, Chalet Compriméé extends the original Chalet font family. It provides an elegant typographical solution with compact, clean letterforms. perfect for anyone looking to add character to their designs. The family includes 10 fonts and offers web versions free up to 12,500 views per month.
11. Highmore - Classic Hand-Painted Style
Inspired by 1930s lettering from the Chicago World's Fair, Highmore captures the timeless quality of brush lettering in commercial art. Its warm character evokes vintage craftsmanship while maintaining contemporary usability. Highmore is particularly well-suited for friendly poster work, invitations, and packaging design.
12. Sabon - A Classical Roman Revival
Sabon, Jan Tschichold's response to a request to design a new version of Claude Garamond's classical Roman, features a smooth texture and a distinctive 'f' in the italic variant. This professional font family has long been popular for typographers setting book text.
13. FF Din - Advertising, Packaging, and Branding Excellence
Created by Albert-Jan Pool between 1995 and 2009, this sans serif is ideal for advertising, packaging, logos, and branding projects. Added to MoMA's digital typefaces for its Architecture and Design collection in 2011, FF Din is available in a range of styles and weights.
14. Oswald - Web-Friendly Sans Serif
Oswald, a reworking of the classic style, has become a popular professional font choice in the world of web design. Its design has been reformed to fit the pixel grid of standard digital screens.
15. Brandon Grotesque - Versatile Geometric Sans Serif
Designed by Hannes von Dohren in 2009, Brandon Grotesque was inspired by the popular geometric-style, sans serif typefaces of the 1920s and 30s. Equipped for complex projects, Brandon Grotesque won the Type Directors Club Award in 2011.
16. Aviano - Art Deco Inspiration
Named after a small town at the base of the Alps in Northern Italy, Aviano typeface embodies the power and timeless beauty of classic letterforms. It was created by type designer Jeremy Dooley, owner of one-man foundry Insigne.
17. Proxima Nova - Popular Choice for Websites
Designed by Mark Simonson, Proxima Nova is a popular professional font used across over 25,000 websites, including Buzzfeed, Wired, and Mashable. Available in seven weights, with matching italics, small caps, condensed, and extra-condensed widths, Proxima Nova offers a versatile and contemporary option.
18. Rockwell - A Classic Geometric Slab Serif
Geometric slab serif Rockwell was inspired by a 1910 font titled Litho Antique. Designer Morris Fuller Benton revived Rockwell in the 1920s before being redesigned and published in 1934 by Monotype.
19. Le Havre - Retro-Inspired Art Deco Design
This art deco-inspired typeface was named after the port where many luxury cruise liners were launched in the 1930s. Compressed capitals, a low x-height, and geometric construction give Le Havre a retro look and feel.
20. Mallory - A Reliable and Stylish Tool
Created by Tobias Frere-Jones, Mallory began life as an experiment in mixing typographic traditions, blending British and American traits. Its 1250+ glyphs ensure it's well-equipped to handle complex projects and visual identity fine-tuning.
21. FF Meta - A Modern Take on the Classics
Created by Erik Spiekermann, FF Meta began life as PT55 in 1985 before being expanded into a renowned professional font family. With a clean, cheery aesthetic, it has been a favorite since the early 1990s. In 2011, the Museum of Modern Art in New York added FF Meta to its permanent collection.
22. Soho - Powerful Slab Serif
Beefy slab serif Soho is the product of renowned type designer Seb Lester. Its extensive 40,000+ glyph set ensures it's optimized for demanding corporate and publishing environments.
23. Davison Spencerian - Classic Lettering Homage
Davison Spencerian is a tribute to one of the most distinguished lettering artists of the 20th century, Meyer 'Dave' Davison. It first appeared in the Photo-Lettering catalogue in 1946.
24. Maelstrom Sans - A Perverse Typographical Adventure
Created by Kris Sowersby in 2019, Maelstrom Sans offers a unique style that leans towards the perverse with its razor-thin spacing, heavy horizontals, and spindly diagonals. This single bold weight font provides a striking alternative to conventional choices.
- The versatile Gilroy exhibits a modern geometric touch and is designed for editorial, web, graphic design, and signage projects.
- Polymath, a grotesque category font, brings a playful personality to the table, offering exceptional versatility for various designs.
- Helvetica Now is an updated version of the essential Helvetica, tailored for modern branding challenges with improved legibility.
- Aktiv Grotesk is a minimalist, grotesque sans typeface designed to be warmer than Univers and without Helvetica's quirks.
- GT Flaire offers a blend of seriousness and playfulness with curve-inspired designs, available in 28 styles for diverse projects.
- Case 2.0 boasts a clear, neutral design for complex branding projects, offering real italics, improved legibility, and unicase features.
- Financier is an elegant serif, designed for the Financial Times newspaper, offering outstanding versatility for news and features.
- Nebulica combines geometric and monospace elements for a modern aesthetic, offering legibility and versatility across diverse applications.
- GT Sectra is a modern blackletter font, combining calligraphy and scalpel knife designs, inspired by classic letterforms.
- Chalet Compriméé extends the original Chalet font family, providing an elegant and compact typographical solution for designers.
- Highmore captures the timeless quality of brush lettering in commercial art, perfect for friendly poster work, invitations, and packaging design.
- Sabon features a smooth texture and a distinctive 'f' in the italic variant, popular for setting book text by professionals.
- FF Din offers advertising, packaging, and branding excellence, appreciated by many professionals in the design industry.
- Oswald is a web-friendly sans serif, reformed to fit standard screens, favored by modern web designers.
- Brandon Grotesque is a versatile geometric sans serif font, inspired by vintage designs of the 1920s and 30s, well-suited for complex projects.
- Aviano embodies the power and beauty of classic letterforms, inspired by Art Deco designs of the 1930s.
- Proxima Nova is a popular professional font choice across 25,000 websites, available in seven weights for various designs.
- Rockwell is a classic geometric slab serif font, inspired by a 1910 font titled Litho Antique, popular since its redesign in the 1930s.
- Le Havre is an art deco-inspired typeface named after a port that launched luxury cruise liners in the 1930s.
- Mallory offers a reliable and stylish tool for complex projects, with over 1250 glyphs for fine-tuning visual identities.
- FF Meta is a modern take on the classics, designed by Erik Spiekermann, popular since the early 1990s and displayed in MoMA's permanent collection.
- Soho is a powerful slab serif font, created by renowned type designer Seb Lester, with an extensive 40,000+ glyph set.
- Davison Spencerian is a tribute to one of the most distinguished lettering artists, Meyer 'Dave' Davison, first appearing in the Photo-Lettering catalogue in 1946.
- Maelstrom Sans offers a unique style with razor-thin spacing, heavy horizontals, and spindly diagonals, providing a striking alternative to conventional choices.
