EMBiz: The Best Fonts For Websites

I'm Cody, Content Director at Elevate My Brand, and I want to tell you about how to choose the best fonts for your website. I'll start with the caveat that there's a reason why a typographer is a specific job and that is because it is more complicated than you may think. 

If you are able to work with a web designer or typographer, then absolutely do that. However, we know that that's not always going to be the case, and you're probably going to have to choose some fonts, typefaces for yourself at some point. And if that is you, then listen up. So here are some tips on how to choose the best fonts for your website. 

Make it legible 

The first tip is that you want to make sure that you choose a good web font. And web fonts are first highly legible and readable. A lot of people are going to be looking at your website on their phone, so it has to be a font that looks good and is legible at all different scales. You also want to consider accessibility. So a really interesting font may be cool from a brand perspective, but also may not be legible by all of your audience members. 

Make it accessible 

Secondly, your fonts also have to be widely available. So in some instances, it may be that if you choose a really niche font that is not available on all devices, then it may not show up for some people, and you're not really getting to control their user experience and the sort of brand aesthetic that you want on your site. So make sure that it's widely available. This is also important because if you do develop, you know, an app or you create some other collateral, maybe even print collateral, you. You want to make sure that that typeface is not just specific to the content management system you're using, or that anyone can go and download it. There are lots of really great sites for that, specifically Google Fonts. If you find a font on there, you can search for ones that are web-compatible. Aso those are going to be free for everyone forever. So make sure that's widely available. 

Make it match 

The third tip is to make sure it matches the brand's identity. I would say this is important, but maybe less important than the other two. You want to make sure that it matches your brand identity. So if you are a brand that's extremely techy and very contemporary, you might not want to choose a web safe font like Times New Roman, because that's going to look sort of antiquated. It's going to maybe look super professional, but it'll look like it's not super modern. So make sure that you're choosing one of the typefaces that matches your brand identity. A typeface for a tech brand might be something more like Roboto, right, or Railway. So make sure that it is widely accessible, that it's super readable, and also matches your brand identity. And also keep in mind that whatever typeface you end up choosing for your website may not be the absolute ideal typeface that you want, because you do have to consider so many different factors. A lot of brands actually have typefaces that are different on their website than all other collateral because it is so important that your typeface is perfect and works for the web. 

Make it seamless 

Another factor to consider is the hierarchy. So maybe you're choosing two typefaces. I certainly wouldn't choose more than that. But if you do choose two typefaces, consider using a slight sans serif for the headings. And sans serif is basically going to be the ones without those sort of like or like ornaments on the ends of the letter accoutrement, if you will. Those are going to be like the simpler, more straightforward ones. Those are going to be like Open Sans, Roboto, Ariel. And then for the body copy, you can use things that are more serif fonts. Those are going to be like the Times New Roman, those that have the sort of things on the ends of the letters. Georgia and Merewether are also really popular choices for that. There may be reasons why you would switch and do sans serif for body copy and serif for headers and vice versa. 

Make it easy

Ultimately, those are the best practices, especially if you don't really know the difference between why you would switch them. I would say default to sans serif for headers and serif for the body. We are going to have some favorite typefaces for you to use, and we'll do our research. We also like to look at competitors to make sure that you're either fitting in or standing out. But ultimately, we want to make sure that you hit those key points, and then you can, if you need support, you can come to us, and we will help you work through that to choose the best typeface for your brand that's legible and widely available, but also can perhaps get a little fun. So that's how to choose the best typeface for your website specifically. And of course, if you ever need any support, you know where to go to elevate your brand.