How to install a font

Written by Jessica Sprague

Tuesday, 03 June 2008 15:10

Let's talk first about where to find great free fonts.

Then we'll talk about how to install your great fonts.

Then we'll talk about how to organize your font collection.

Click the Read More button to see this article!

Finding Fonts

I have some favorite sites I go when I'm in the mood to download some new fonts. Here they are:

Dafont.com. Probably my favorite one, since it's so stinkin' HUGE! They have 450 pages of free fonts for Windows and Mac, and you can try them with your own text before you download. You could get lost in this place pretty easily. I have!
UrbanFonts.com provides a ready source to download fonts for free as well as commercial fonts for both Macs and Windows. And the special touches, like articles, a font blog and a message board, mean users don't have to just stop by and stock up on fonts. You can learn about fonts and participate in an online community dedicated to the art and craft of typography.
Blue Vinyl Fonts offers free Mac fonts, free Windows fonts and free TrueType fonts. On the main page look for their menu on the left and click on the first link "Freeware Fonts" and you'll be greeted with a quick Terms of use. Read through and then enter. You'll find page after page of good free fonts. Look for Dance Craze and Blue Melody.
House of Lime offers some great fonts, but the absolute BEST thing about this site is the enormous collection of dingbats. Just click Dings in the menu. I really like Designer Mixed for some cool digital accents!
Misprinted Type . This web site is run by an awesome designer named Eduardo Recife, and although there aren't a ton of fonts here, what you WILL find are gorgeous, distress-y, and delicious. :)

Installing New Fonts

In the font web page, click on the appropriate download link (Mac or Windows). If you have a choice between TrueType and something else, always pick TrueType.
Save your font .zip files to a place on your hard drive. I actually created a folder called Fonts.
Unzip the files. I just unzip mine to the same place, or a sub-folder.

Windows Vista : Right-click on the font and choose Install

Mac: Place your font files in /Library/Fonts

Windows XP: View this video.

Font Management: Windows

My hands-down recommendation for managing your growing collection of fonts, is a little free program called The Font Thing. Unfortunately, it's a Windows-only program.

The Font thing is available for free download right here:

Click here to read more and download The Font Thing.

After you've got it installed, it'll sort through your computer and display all your installed fonts for you in a window that looks like this:

The left pane shows three tabs at the top. The Installed tab shows you a list of all your fonts, and you can click on each font and see a preview in the right pane. Slide the bottom slider to see the font at different sizes.

The Collections tab is my favorite one. You can create groups of fonts based on any criteria you like. Here are my collections. You can add to a collection by right-clicking on an individual font.

You can create new collections by clicking inside of the top pane in the Collections tab:

But my favorite feature is when I use BOTH collections (in the left pane), and then click the Multiple tab above the right pane. This shows me ALL of the fonts for that collection in a list:

Let me know if you have questions on downloading and installing fonts, and using The Font Thing!

Font Management: Mac

If you are running Mac OS X, you are super lucky to have Font Book already installed on your system! It's perfect for most users, and can help you search, browse, group, and find fonts.

Here's an overview of Font Book from the Apple web site.

Summary

Fonts can add incredible character, emotion, and sophistication to your pages. They can really help you complete a look, and they're worth spending some time organizing to find JUST the right one. Hopefully these tips help you to get a handle on the fonts you've got, and of course, go find more! :D