A Guide to Font Combinations Part One

Just a few short years ago, designers were severely restricted in their choice of web fonts. The options were generally limited to system fonts and hoping that the site’s visitors had those fonts installed. 

While web fonts were technically possible in the late 90s, they didn’t become widely used until 

2009, when the WOFF format became available and part of the W3C open standards. That opened up an entirely new world of typographic options for designers. 

And therein lies the dilemma: now that there are literally thousands of typefaces available for web designers, how does one go about creating font combinations that work well together and support the content being presented? 

Good typography and using the best font combinations elevate a design from its peers and create a more delightful user experience. Effective type combinations add visual interest to a logo design that can keep a visitor on the page longer. 

Bad type, by contrast, can make content harder to read and less pleasurable for the person reading it. 

Learning to combine fonts effectively is an important stepping stone in a designer’s education, and one that should continuously be refined and improved upon. Designers who master typography can make even the simplest design more effective.

Following basic typography guidelines for combining fonts is the best place to start. Once those “rules” are mastered, designers can branch out and experiment to create typographic combinations that bend or break those rules.