Although sometimes overlooked, solid typography is one of the most important parts of web design. Simply put, the misuse of fonts can prove detrimental for a layout.
It is a web designer’s job to entice the user into reading through the page; and using the ‘right’ font(or fonts) can play a pivotal role in attaining the user’s attention.
Luckily for web designers the Internet holds many solid resources which provide fonts that can be used commercially – sometimes even for free.
To help shed light on some of these resources I’ve compiled a list of five notable font foundries & font resources online.
Google Fonts
First on the list is Google Fonts which lets you choose from over 700 different fonts, all of which can be commercially used for free.
Google Fonts provides font-faces that can match virtually any theme and can easily be integrated into a project with one additional line of code. When push comes to shove, Google Fonts gives you the tools to be successful when choosing the best fonts for your projects.
TypeKit
TypeKit is the first of two products in this list by Adobe. The price of TypeKit varies depending on the plan, however it delivers an incredible portfolio of professional fonts.
Fonts inside the TypeKit foundry are masterfully crafted which makes it incredibly easy to choose a font by providing so many quality options. TypeKit also provides a great user interface for seeking out the correct font family. Also TypeKit provides users with a library of pre-built font stacks with similar typefaces that go well together.
Edge Web Fonts
New on the scene is Edge Web Fonts, the second product by Adobe. You can think of Edge Web Fonts as Adobe’s version of Google Fonts. It has an extremely friendly user interface with an easy-to-browse font catalog.
Moreover the interface of Edge Web Fonts is quite similar to that of TypeKit’s. You can easily sift through 500+ different font families provided for free by Edge Web Fonts. The release of Edge Web Fonts provides yet another fantastic free resource for web designers.
Font Squirrel
Although Font Squirrel does not have the sponsorship of Google or Adobe, it provides great resources web designers need to properly communicate their message.
FontSquirrel offers hundreds of fonts that can be sorted by things such as the type of license for a font-family, as well as a number of different styles or text formats.
The League of Movable Type
Last in this list is League of Movable Type, a unique open source font foundry dedicated to broadening the horizons of typography.
After getting started in 2009 they worked hard to provide the best possible digital typefaces. They offer a wide range of fonts such as League Spartan that can be downloaded directly to your computer.
The League of Movable Type is an awesome movement so you should definitely check it out. After all, it takes groups such as this to raise the bar on quality design.
Hopefully you’ve gained some new insight towards what the world of web fonts has to offer. If you don’t already, you should definitely consider using one of the font foundries mentioned above; They offer thousands of fonts that aid in providing a solid user experience without much extra work.
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