13. Space Mono
Geometric fuses with grotesque in this sci-fi-esque design. A fixed-width family in Regular and Bold (with italics – Regular Italic being our favourite, thanks to its wonderful descenders and serifs), Space Mono is one cool display face. As well as in headlines, use the Regular weight sparingly for short passages of text.
14. Kaushan Script
The calligraphic, energetic Kaushan is a script font that deliberately avoids typographic perfection, with slight variation in angles between verticals in characters and uneven positioning along the baseline. For a script font it’s very readable, even at small sizes – but of course we’d only recommend it for headlines, used in moderation.
15. Julius Sans One
There's more than a hint of Roman here, with a modern twist to some of the legs, making Julius Sans One a thin display font perfect for subtle, yet still impactful, headlines. Pair it with the likes of Lato Light, maybe, for a refined, low-key style.
16. Courgette
A brush script with flourishing impact, Courgette is a medium-contrast italic-only font. Yes, you’ll want to use it larger than 40pt, but it was designed so that the low stroke contrast can even work in body text (although we’d suggest you are cautious if you take that advice).
17. Wire One
Wire One is so thin you’re not going to want to use it at anything below 12pt – and even that may be pushing legibility. It’s a lovely condensed sans, nonetheless, and its minuscule dot terminals are quite beautiful.
18. Cormorant
This is one behemoth of a free typeface. It comprises Roman, Italic, Infant, Infant Italic, Garamond, Garamond Italic, Upright Cursive, Small Caps, and Unicase; and five weights – Light, Regular, Medium, SemiBold and Bold. You could easily build a whole style around this Claude Garamond-inspired number.
19. Righteous
There’s a touch of avant-garde in this display font, inspired by the capital letterforms from the deco posters of Hungarian artist Robert Berény for Modiano. While the lowercase ‘e’ may be a little sharp for some, it’s without doubt an arresting font when used at large point sizes.
20. Bungee Shade
If you want ultimate impact with your headlines – and even a start for your graphic projects – Bungee Shade is a great shout. Bungee is a celebration of urban signage, and Shade is just one of five variants. Check out the regular Bungee for a less extravagant, yet still impactful display font (and Bungee Inline for a lovely reversal of Shade).
21. Amatic SC
‘Hand-drawn’ and ‘web fonts’ don’t often go together in the same sentence, but Amatic SC (small caps) is undoubtedly one of the better open source offerings out there. Use it sparingly in both headlines and shorter measures of text for a crafty feel.
22. Roboto
Roboto is one of the most common open source web fonts out there (used on over 16,000,000 sites worldwide), and for good reason. It's a surprisingly rhythmic sans that can be used alongside Roboto Condensed and Roboto Slab for a consistent, contemporary style.
23. Arvo
A geometric slab, Arvo is equally at home in print as it is on screen – as long as you’re using it for headlines, that is. Arvo is hugely legible at any size over 30pt, and – particularly in the Bold weight – a font that will stop your viewers in their tracks.
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