No More Boring Fonts

Until recently, type on the web was “Arial.” Or “Times New Roman.” That’s because web designers had to stick to using fonts that viewers would likely have installed on their own computers.

If you wanted to deviate from these fonts, you needed to embed text in images, which introduced a whole new set of problems since images can’t be read by search engines or translated into other languages.

Those days are finally over.

Now, your web designer has the choice of hundreds of fonts for your website, thanks to online font services. These services “host” the fonts. The designer chooses the desired fonts and embeds a bit of code in the website. Your website will look pretty! Hooray!

Two of the more popular sites for hosted fonts are Google Fonts and Typekit.

Google Fonts offers hundreds of fonts and is completely free. The choice is a little limited but there are plenty of good options. We use Google Fonts for most of our clients’ websites.

Typekit goes beyond Google Fonts in offering classic, the ones that cost a pretty penny to actually buy. Typekit is a complete, professional solution and is the best choice when strict branding is required – you have to have Optima for example. It requires a yearly fee.

Chances are your web designer is using one or both of these font services. Inquire if you’re interested.

At Blue Kite, we’ve been really excited about the potential for web fonts to change the very fabric of the web. Beautiful typography makes the web much nicer to browse!