Best Google fonts for the website in 2022 | Crealeon
Fonts play a huge role on the quality of presentation and ease of perception of information. Webmasters take their nuances into account, because the choice of fonts has an impact on site visitors. Google Fonts is the best free font catalog with about 1,000 font families in more than 135 languages. We have made a selection of 10 of the most interesting variants, suitable for installation on the site and PC.
Google Fonts
The fonts are divided into families, but the fundamental difference is the presence or absence of serifs – strokes on the ends of the letters. This is reflected in the name of fonts: “serif” means serif, if there is the particle “sans” (from the French “sans”), then the font will be without serifs. They come in all different shapes and sizes: straight, rounded, perpendicular, thick, thin and so on. Serifs are considered to improve the readability of text because they visually create a horizontal line of direction for the letters.
However, for the Internet, and in general for reading from a monitor screen, fonts without serifs are easier to perceive. They are easier to digitize and look sharper. Thanks to Google Fonts service, there is a rating of the most popular web fonts used in the world. We selected ten variants of the most readable Cyrillic (Russian) fonts, briefly characterize them, give links to download them, and tell how to install them on the site or computer.
Best fonts from Google Fonts – Top 15
- Roboto is the most popular font in the world
- Open Sans is the most readable font.
- Montserrat is the best sans serif typeface
- Roboto Condensed – for text paragraphs
- Source Sans Pro for web applications
- Oswald is a solid header font
- Merriweather is an elegant serif typeface
- Noto Sans is a sleek and simple font.
- Yanone Kaffeesatz for shouty titles
- Caveat is a beautiful uppercase typeface.
- Manrope is the most readable font.
- Cousine is the best Cyrillic font
- Raleway – popular sans serif typeface
- Noto Sans is the best Russian font.
- Marck Script is a beautiful writing font.
1. Roboto is the most popular font in the world.
Creation date: 2011Total styles: 12 pcs.Used by: 26 million websites
Roboto is a family of free fonts with many weight options: Thin, Light, Regular, Medium, Bold, Black. The font was invented by designer Christian Robertson and was first introduced with Android 4.0 “Ice Cream Sandwich” as a system font. Today it is the most popular font on the Internet.
2. Open Sans – the most readable font
Creation date: 2010Total styles: 10 pcs.Used by: 23 million sites.
Open Sans – looks nice, easy to read on screens. No serif, designed by Steve Mathesson, one of today’s leading experts in typography. It is the 2nd most popular typeface on the web, Google uses it for its ads and some websites.
3. Montserrat is the best sans serif font
Date of creation: 1989Total styles: 18 pcs.Used by: 7.5 million websites
Montserrat is a sans serif font that looks simple, interesting, and easy to read. It was invented in 1989 by Juliet Ulanowski, a designer from Buenos Aires, and named after her hometown. Styles of varying degrees of boldness are added periodically to this day.
4. Roboto Condensed – for text paragraphs
Creation date: 2011Total styles: 6 pcs.Used by: 2.9 million sites.
Roboto Condensed is another creation by Christian Robertson, which he has brought into a separate family. It’s a narrow, elongated font that’s quite articulate and pleasant to look at. Good for long screen reading.
5. Source Sans Pro – for web applications
Creation date: 2012Total styles: 6 pcs.Used by: 5.4 million sites.
Source Sans Pro – contains a full set of styles, Adobe’s first open access font. Developed by Paul Hunt, good for user interfaces. Supports Cyrillic in all styles except italics.
6. Oswald – a solid font for headings
Creation date: 2011Total styles: 6 pcs.Used by: 5.4 million websites
Oswald is a relatively new font, created by artist Vernon Adams in 2011, later styles were added, of which there are only six. The font is elongated, stylish and looks impressive in headlines. Widely used on websites and in applications for PCs and mobile platforms.
7. Merriweather is an elegant serif font
Creation date: 2010Total styles: 8 pcs.Used by: 4.1 million websites
Merriweather is a font with clearly defined serifs, elongated and slightly compressed, with an open, flowing form of letters. It was designed specifically for display on electronic screens. It looks elegant and well readable. There is also a sans serif version with the prefix “sans”.
8. Noto Sans is a smooth and simple font.
Creation date: 2012Total styles: 4 pcs.Used by: 3.1 million websites
Noto Sans is a font with simplified design of letters: simple lines, no serifs, letters a little wider than average and their thickness too. Was designed specifically for computers, taking into account the peculiarities of digitization. Looks simple, smooth, well readable. Suitable for paragraph text.
9. Yanone Kaffeesatz – for screaming headlines
Date of creation: 2004Total styles: 4 pcs.Used by: 460k sites.
Yanone Kaffeesatz – the font is styled like the typography of coffee houses of the 20s. Thin, elongated, looks a little old-fashioned and expensive, excellent for titles, especially advertising. Used in the printing industry of many countries and large companies.
10. Caveat is a beautiful uppercase font
Date of creation: 2014Total styles: 2 pcs.Used by: 110,000 sites.
Caveat is an elegant uppercase font, its profile is easily recognized and perfectly readable. The font is playful and lightweight, suitable for subtle headings, some footnotes, and letters of a personal nature. Beautiful and relaxed, devoid of officiousness, but certainly not suitable for the role of the main site.
11. Manrope is the most readable font.
Creation date: 2018Total styles: 7 pcs.
Manrope is a new (2018) font that is easy to read. It is similar to many others, but is characterized by simplicity and calibrated proportions. It looks best in “Extra-light” and “Light” configurations, it becomes a bit heavy in bold. This font can write a blog, for example. You can also use it as the main font on the site. There are Cyrillic and Latin versions.
12. Cousine – the best Cyrillic font
Date of creation: 2004Total Styles: 7 pcs.
Cousine is a pleasant font that doesn’t tire the eyes for a long time, there is practically no need to look closely, it is easy to read and doesn’t strain, especially in Regular style. One of the most successful, widely used fonts in the Monotype format, includes both Latin and Cyrillic versions.
13. Raleway is a popular sans serif font
Creation date: 2012Total styles: 18 pcs.
Raleway is a neat, aesthetic font with a huge number of styles for all occasions. It can be used alone to design an entire website, everything will look elegant and easy to read. Included in the top ten most popular fonts in Google Fonts, which in itself says about its attractiveness, versatility in use.
14. Noto Sans – the best font for the Russian language
Date of creation: 2015Total styles: 4 pcs.
Noto Sans is an intelligible, not annoying font, suitable for prolonged reading. Laconic, moderately stretched, moderately elongated, with letter spacing just above average. Italics are the most attractive, and can be used to draw attention to important wording on the site.
15. Marck Script – a beautiful writing font
Creation date: 2011Total styles: 1 pc.
Marck Script is an elegant, rounded font that’s a pleasure to look at. Yes, it’s ornate, a little sloppy, but it’s precise and reads better than many other written fonts. It can be used, for example, for headlines or highlighting important points on sites dedicated to women’s beauty care, clothing stores, invitations to celebrations, etc. Presented in a single style, which is not surprising for this typeface.
Which font should I choose for my website?
Captain Hindsight would not lie when he remarked, with an important look, that fonts play a huge role on any website. One recent study conducted in 2020 by the Nielsen Norman Group concluded that before reading the entire text, people run through it with their eyes, first of all the headlines. And then they decide whether they are interested to continue reading or go to a more convenient/useful source of information. With cell phones, by the way, on average, more often finish reading from cover to cover, but the content should be enhanced legibility of the font.
There was such a thing: go to the site, have not read anything yet, and already appreciate the quality of the formatting of the material and looked at for a few seconds? No one will try to read the scribbles, unless there is some rare/important information. It’s easier to find another site in a couple of seconds, thankfully, search engines are not stingy with the output.
We recommend using simple, readable fonts, which are already popular and customary for the vast majority of people: Open Sans, Roboto, Montserrat, etc. But it is worth considering the nature of the content. For example, jokes, designed in Times 10% of readers considered more funny than the same in Arial.
Need to consider the topic of the site and the style of the font. How do they fit together? For obituaries and descriptions of hilarious adventures need different fonts. You have to feel it, to see it. Do you need persuasiveness, lightness, ridiculousness or catchiness? These are all psychological points. In general, give these recommendations:
- More than 3 fonts on the site should not be used. Turn the site into a non-readable circus is easy, throwing mixed, inappropriate fonts, especially on one page. Let the main text is one style, titles – another, emphasis – a third. This is a reasonable maximum. You can have the same font in different styles altogether.
- Readability should be at a level. Pick a font until the text flows into your head like a stream into a river.
- Choose font pairs carefully. If the site is more than 1 font, the others should be friends with each other. Anything goes wrong – change the less successful one for another. Ask your friends/acquaintances to evaluate typography. Just let them tell you their opinion – like it or not.
- Keep it logical. This means that headings should be larger than subheadings, much less plain text, as well as richer, that is, clearly stand out. Font colors should not merge with the substrate – the background is important, it should not interfere with the reading, and simplify it.
In general, the choice of fonts requires the usual common sense and a little taste. Nothing complicated. In principle, using designers, you can not change the standard fonts templates, they already look good – a great option for those who are too lazy to get into it all.
How do I download a font from Google Fonts?
On Google Fonts, select the font you like. In the upper right corner with the plus sign you need to add it to your collection. After that the tab “Families Selected” will appear at the bottom right – it will display all the fonts that have been selected. You can download the font by clicking on the corresponding download icon.
How do I install a font on my computer?
After downloading the zip file to your PC and opening the folder with the font you need to install it in Windows 10 or MacOS by double-clicking on it. A window will open with a preview of the font in which you need to click “Install” at the top. After that you can use it in text, graphic editors, such as Photoshop and not only.
How do I change the font in my browser?
Any installed fonts can be used in your browser (Google Chrome, Yandex Browser, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, etc.). Let’s show you how to change fonts in Google Chrome, which is considered the most popular browser among Internet users.
Open: “Settings and Management of Google Chrome (…)” → “Settings” → “Appearance” → “Adjust fonts”:
How do I connect a font to a CMS site?
CMS is a content management system, the so-called “engine” (a special script, distribution), which is installed on the hosting. Engines allow you to build full-featured sites, blogs, online stores: add / delete pages, change the template design, connect plug-ins, etc.
To manually install the font on a site running on one of the CMS (such as: WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, etc.), you need to copy and add the code embedding the font in the source code of the template in the area <head>…</head>. At the same time, in the CSS file specify the rule to determine the connected families. Sample code for both cases the service provides on the “Families Selected” tab – just copy and paste.
An example of connecting fonts:
How to set the font on the website builder?
Website constructor is the easiest and fastest way to create a small website, landing page (one-page) or online store without coding knowledge and without the help of programmers. Unlike CMS, the designers are much easier and more functional out of the box, they come with hosting, a set of templates, widgets and other necessary SEO and marketing tools.
It’s very easy to change the font on the designer – it’s enough to make a few clicks and choose the desired text size, shape or line spacing. Let’s show examples of how easy it is to work with fonts based on the most popular online designers – uKit and Wix.
Conclusions and recommendations
Google Fonts is the best typographic directory of design fonts in the world, its library contains over 1000 families of various web fonts. The search engine giant provides an opportunity to legally and free of charge use hundreds of font variants, allows to download them and gives instructions on how to install them on sites.
The legibility of text and the attractiveness of fonts have a tangible impact on the behavior of site visitors. We have included 10 popular fonts, any of which you can use for free on your site, working on any engine or sitebuilder. Downloading a font from Google Fonts on your PC is easy and only takes a couple of minutes. Once installed on Windows or MacOS, the font will be available in all applications that support their selection – Word, Photoshop, browsers, etc.
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