Most logos have text of some kind. Whether it’s the full name of the company, a slogan or tagline, or just a monogram of the company’s initials, the font the text is displayed in matters for your branding. If you’re stuck on which font to pick, here are some ideas to get you started.
Before we get into the myriad of logo font options, let’s break down how to choose the right font for your logo design. First, you’ll want to choose your font family. Then you need to think about how you’re going to use your logo and how it will match your brand identity. After that, look for inspiration from brands that are trying to accomplish something similar.
The first choice you’ll need to make when you create your logo is which type of font you want to use. The options are
Each font family has its own messages and associations that will speak to different audiences.
Serif fonts have little feet at the end of each stroke in the letter. They create a traditional, timeless feel. Examples of common serif fonts include:
Sans serif fonts don’t have the feet on the letters. They’re seen as more modern and forward thinking. Some examples of common sans serif fonts include:
Slab serif fonts have bigger, blockier feet than standard serif fonts. They’re known for a contemporary, modern feel. Some examples of common slab serif fonts include:
Script fonts are typography in cursive. They give an elegant, personal touch to logos. Some examples of common script fonts include:
Some fonts are stylized and unique to the point that they don’t fit neatly into these categories. These are called decorative fonts or display fonts. They're often dramatic, bold, and artistic.
Logos appear in a wide variety of places and contexts. Which ones do you plan on using yours in? Are you using it for a mobile app? Are you printing it on posters? Or signage and billboards? These will all require different font and design needs.
Your logo is an important part of building your brand identity. It’s important to design it and pick a font in a way that sends the message you want to send to your audience.
Once you know what you want in a logo font, look for inspiration from other logos that accomplish similar things and look for what they do well.
Most logos only need one font, but sometimes you might need two. For example, if you include a tagline or the business type in the logo design. For example, using a simpler font for the word “barber shop” in small text under the logo. If you need to use two fonts, choose a pair that complements each other well and are distinguishable from each other.
Here are some tips for pairing fonts together with a logo.
Using a loud statement font for the main logo font and a simpler, more subdued font for the secondary font keeps the attention where it belongs and doesn’t clutter up the logo space.
You can also use the same font for both, but a heavier, bolder version for the main font and a lighter version for the secondary font. This creates a clean, consistent look.
The main thing you want to avoid doing is pairing two different statement fonts in one logo. Doing this is distracting and can clutter up the limited space.
These serif fonts will give your logo an air of classic sophistication.
This typeface is recognizable by its flow, sharp serifs, and tall accents. Its versatility and scalability make it a great font for logos.
Serif, Free
Christian Thalmann
Catharsis Fonts
Scalability, brands that want a classic look that doesn’t sacrifice visual appeal.
Century was designed by a father-son duo at the turn of the 20th century. Its readability and versatility have ensured that it stays widely used today.
Serif, Free
Linn Boyd Benton and Morris Fuller Benton
Corporate settings, newspapers and magazines.
Like Century, Garamond is another corporate classic designed by the Bentons. Its lines are heavier than Century’s and the letters are further apart. This makes the font easy to read and scale for a variety of needs.
Serif, Paid
Linn Boyd Benton and Morris Fuller Benton
Publishing, scalable for headlines and body text.
Bodoni is an old font. It was designed in 1800, but remains a timeless serif typeface that gives the brands that use it an air of sophistication and authority.
Serif, Free
Giambattista Bodoni
Fashion brands and other brands that want to exude a classic, authoritative style.
This 1970s-inspired font combines soft lines and angled strokes to create a typeface with a groovy personality.
Serif, Paid
Jorge Cisterna
Latinotype
Available in a variety of styles and weights
Brands with a groovy, retro feel
Ogg is inspired by and named after 20th century hand lettering artist Oscar Ogg. Details like the interconnected letterforms make it a stand-out modern logo font.
Calligraphic Sans Serif, Paid
Lucas Sharp
Village
Available in five weights with an italic version of each. Ogg Text is useful for body text and long form copy.
Companies with an expressive, luxurious brand personality.
GT Super was released in 2018, but it takes inspiration from typefaces used for newspapers in the 1970s and 80s. Its sharp serifs and varied stroke widths make it an expressive font for logos and headings.
Serif, Paid
Noël Leu
Grilli Type
Brands with a retro aesthetic and logos that need to look good in print and digital alike.
Baskerville is another old typeface, designed to be cut into metal in the 1750s. At the time, it was a contemporary twist on old-style typefaces. It has stood the test of time and continues to be used in graphic design today.
Serif, Free
John Baskerville
Cufon Fonts
Book design, brands with a classic, authoritative feel.
This unique font's asymmetrical serifs give it the appearance of movement in a way that few other typefaces can.
Asymmetrical Serif, Paid
Evert Bloemsma
Available in eight variations
Sport, transport, and other motion-based industries.
Neue Swift was designed to emphasize the separations between words and lines to make text easier to read. This makes it a great choice for a secondary font in a logo where space is limited.
Serif, Paid
Gerard Unger
Available in twelve typefaces:
Brands in the financial, health, and nonprofit industries
Revista Stencil combines the timeless style of a classic serif font with the rustic artistry of a stencil font.
Stencil Display Font, Paid
Daniel Hernández, Paula Nazal Selaive, and Marcelo Quiroz
Latinotype
Trendsetting brands
The design of Calluna started when designer Jos Buivenga tried out adding slab serifs to his Museo font. The results were this crisp font that draws the eyes to the top right corner of each glyph.
Slab Serif, Free
Jos Buivenga
Available in eight styles.
A crisp, clean aesthetic.
Futura is one of the classics for a reason. It may have been released in 1927, but its versatility makes it a great font for web design as well as print. Its minimalist design is made of geometric shapes, straight lines that are almost even in weight, and very few curves
Sans Serif, Paid
Paul Renner
Bauer Foundry
Available in a variety of weights, styles, and widths
Bold, no-frills brands. Commonly used for clothing companies
If you know fonts, you know Helvetica. Since its release in the 1950s, this king of the sans serif typefaces has been the perfect logo font for companies all over the world.
Sans Serif, Paid
Eduard Hoffmann and Max Miedinger
Understated logos that need to look good in a variety of settings
Orkney is a unique, yet functional geometric typeface that can look good and clean in a almost any print or screen project.
Geometric Sans Serif, Paid
Samuel Oakes, Alfredo Pradil, and Cristiano Sobral
Available in four weights
A sleek look without sacrificing screen and print legibility
Proxima Nova has been especially popular in web design since its 2005 release. Its modern, geometric shapes make it the font of choice for plenty of digital media companies.
Sans Serif, Paid
Mark Simonson
Digital-first media brands going for a clean, sleek look
Avenir is a perfect choice for a minimalist logo. It’s classified as a geometric typeface, but it pushes the boundaries of the classification with details like thicker vertical lines in the O. The font was released in 1988 as an update on previous popular sans serif fonts like Futura.
Geometric Sans Serif, Paid
Adrian Frutiger
Linotype
A modern, understated look
This typeface was designed with versatility in mind. It’s intended to be legible at any size and in any setting. Swiss Passports have used it for their lettering since 1985.
Sans Serif, Paid
Adrian Frutiger
Linotype
Available in nineteen typefaces
Utilitarian brands with scalable logo use needs
Bowlby One SC strives to combine utility and decoration to create the ultimate eye-catching font.
All Caps Display Font, Free
Vernon Adams
Also available as a lowercase font
Brands with a rough, ambitious feel
Bebas Neue is an extremely popular free font, often known as “the Helvetica of free fonts” by typography experts. Like Helvetica, Bebas Neue is versatile, modern, and uncomplicated.
Sans Serif, Free
Ryochi Tsunekawa
Fontfabric Type Foundry
Available in five styles
Also supports the Cyrilic alphabet
Brands looking for a technically straightforward, yet warm feel
Agentur is a contemporary take on a traditional calligraphic style. It can make a great logo for a wide variety of industries and uses.
Calligraphic Sans Serif, Paid
Kenneth Knutsen
Good Type Foundry
Available in text and display versions
Logos that need to stand out in print and on the web
GT America is a contemporary take on the crude typeface design style of the early 19th century. It makes a great sans serif logo font for brands looking for a modern spin on a classic look.
Sans Serif, Paid
Noël Leu
Grilli Type
Editorials and publishing
The contrast between Orelo’s thin and thick lines make it unique for a sans serif typeface.
Variable Sans Serif, Paid
Adrien Midzic
Pizza Typefaces
Available in over 100 styles, including a variable font which makes it great for animations.
Digital-first brands
Whyte Inktrap takes advantage of a feature from typography’s past to create a quirky design. In the past, some letterforms were designed with missing corners that would later fill with ink during printing. These are called ink traps. Though they are no longer necessary today, they sure do look cool!
Sans Serif, Paid
Johannes Breyer, Fabian Harb, and Erkin Karamemet
Dinamo
Available in ten different weights and italics for each one. They also offer a version without the signature ink traps for body text.
Creative, quirky, and retro brand personalities
Designed in 2014, Panton is one of the newer fonts to the game. Its straight lines and rounded edges give it a bold, yet approachable look.
Sans Serif, Paid
Svet Simov, Ivan Petrov, and Simov Svetoslav
Available in 34 variations and 36 weights.
Printed merchandise, legibility in all mediums.
This sans serif typeface was designed in 1995 for use in children’s books. With its curls and swoops, each letter is infused with a childlike wonder.
Sans Serif, Paid
Rosemary Sassoon
Playful, family-friendly brands
Apple may have stopped using Myriad for its logotype in 2017, but it’s still a versatile font perfect for digital branding.
Sans Serif, Paid
Robert Slimbach and Carol Twombly
Digital branding, a neutral look
Glober combines perfect geometric forms with an approachable coziness. It' known for its readability in several languages.
Sans Serif, Free and pro versions available
Ivan Petrov and Svetoslav Simov
Available in nine weights, each with a matching italic:
Brands with a technical, trendy feel
Designed in 2016, this striking, modern font is a new addition to the typography world.
All Caps Sans Serif, Free and Pro versions available
Radomir Tinkov
Available in twenty weights. Supports the Cyrilic alphabet.
Companies with a cutting-edge feel, multilingual design
Roboto Slab has a softer look than most other slab serif fonts.
Slab Serif, Free
Christian Robertson
Easy font pairings with Roboto and other sans-serif fonts
This slab serif typeface was originally designed for print, but it’s been modified to work better on the web for text of all sizes.
Slab Serif, Paid
Jorge Cisterna
Latinotype
Digital-first brands, can work as a display font and as body text
Grenale is a more elegant choice than the average slab serif font. With its thin weights, contrasting strokes, balanced spacing, and geometric shapes, this modern font is the perfect choice for high-end logotypes.
Slab Serif, Paid
Jeremy Dooley
Modern, high-end brands
Didot was designed in 1799 and continues to bring elegance and grace in the fashion industry with its thick lines, thin curves, and squared off serifs.
Serif, Paid
Firmin Didot
Available in several weights
Fashion brands and other brands that prioritize an elegant feel
This font may have been created in 2016, but its look is retro and quirky.
Slab Serif, Free
Nathan Thompson
Retro, quirky brands
Isabella Ahmadzadeh created this font as part of her graphic design thesis and its modernity shows!
Slab Serif, Paid
Isabella Ahmadzadeh
Multilingual design, pairing with sans serif fonts
This 2012 font is inspired by a number of classic typefaces from the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
Slab Serif, Free
Vernon Adams
Logo design, display text, and body text for casual, contemporary brands
This 2008 font may not look handwritten, but its strokes and flourishes are inspired by human handwriting, giving it a joyful, spirited feel.
Slab Serif, Paid
Veronika Burian and José Scaglione
Youthful, outgoing brands in print and digital formats
Rockwell’s thick, bold lines make it a better choice for logos and signs than body text.
Slab Serif, Free
Morris Fuller Benton
Brands that want to express confidence in their logo and signage design
The bracketed slab serifs that are a different width than the letterforms give Baltica a more classic look that its slab serif typeface counterparts.
Slab Serif, Paid
Vera Chiminoca, Isay Slutsker, et al.
Polygraphmash Type Design Bureau
Available in four styles with matching italics
Supports the Greek and Cyrilic alphabets
Brands that want to communicate tradition and authority
Alfa Slab One is a more contemporary, heavier take on Six-Lines Pica Egyptian, a typeface created by Robert Thorne in 1821.
Slab Serif, Free
JM Solé
Creating contrast between your logo and other body text
Variane Script is a clean, legible handwritten font. It looks chic in a variety of settings.
Handwritten Script, Paid
Boy Moch Tomi
Chic, elegant logos, printing on branded merchandise
Belinda script is an elegant brush script that doesn’t overdo it.
Brush Script, Paid
Mika Melvas
Brands with a sophisticated aesthetic, print settings
Grand Hotel’s upright, meticulous cursive lettering was inspired by the 1937 film Cafe Metropole. Its old film quality makes it a great fit for logos that want to emulate that feeling.
Script, Free
Brian J. Bonislawsky and Jim Lyles
Bakeries, hotels, and other businesses with a vintage flair
Hoodson Script is bouncy, retro, and straight up fun! It makes a great statement font for logos, posters, packaging, and more.
Brush Script, Free
Hendra Maulia
Logos, posters, and packaging for brands with a playful feel
Hickory Jack is a script font that isn’t trying too hard. It’s understated and easy to read while still looking interesting.
Handwritten Script, Free
Brittney Murphy
Available in display and text variations
Brands with a casual, understated feel
There are handwritten scripts, then there’s this script typeface that actually looks like cursive handwriting without hours of calligraphy training.
Handwritten Script, Paid
Hanneke Classen
Fontforecast
Available in five styles
Vintage and natural goods brands
This new script typeface inspired by 1930s American signage will look right at home in artisanal shops.
Brush Script, Paid
Alejandro Paul
Sudtipos
Hip, vintage-inspired brands
This 2010 font is exactly what its name sounds like: geometric and exotic. The wire frames can either be filled or left open, making room for a variety of designs.
Geometric Display Font, Free
Jos Buivenga
Available in sixteen styles
Brands with a stylized feel
The broken lines in the middle of the letterforms give One Day an eye-catching, contemporary look that’s great for print, digital media, and logo design alike.
All Caps Display Font, Free
Nawras Moneer
Versatile brands with digital and print needs
Abril Fatface combines the weights associated with slab serifs and the sophistication associated with didones to create an elegant, yet funky experience.
Slab Serif Display Font, Paid
José Scaglione and Veronika Burian
Elegant headlines for publishing and editorials
Canela isn’t quite a serif font, but it isn't quite a sans serif font either. It doesn’t have the little feet that define a serif font, but the contrast between the thicker and thinner lines are more typical of the former than the latter.
Display Font, Paid
Miguel Reyes
Commercial Type
Bold, stylish brands that defy classification.
Now that you know a little more about the best logo fonts in each font type, let’s take inspiration from the fonts that some iconic brands use for their logos.
The stylized, futuristic font PlayStation uses in its PS4 logo is instantly recognizable and represents the leap forward in gaming technology that the console brought at the time of its release.
The Facebook typeface is the Klavica font with a few minor adjustments. The F and A are straighter than the standard font, the C is wider, and the separation in the standard font’s K was eliminated to give it a cleaner look.
The classic, distinct look and the flexibility of the Bodoni font make it a great choice for elegant fashion brands. The Vogue logo uses a heavy, wide version of the font.
Spencerian script is common in logos of companies that were founded in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Ford is another example. The script is elegant and stands the test of time.
FF Meta Bold is thicker and more casual than the standard FF Meta typeface. The heaviness of this variation puts more emphasis on the white text against the blue background.
Myriad is a strong, modern, professional font. Visa, Deloitte, and Rolls-Royce also use it. Walmart used it as part of their modernizing rebrand.
This typeface has appeared in The New York Times’ masthead for decades. The highly stylized font gives an air of authority and history.
The Nike swoosh may stand on its own, but when the brand does use its wordmark, it’s in a specific variation of the Futura font. It’s broad, bold, and tweaked to make it appear slanted.
Gill Sans was designed in the 1920s by Eric Gill. Since then, it’s been a popular choice for big brands that want a timeless, practical look that works no matter how you scale it. Other brands that use it include the BBC, Tag Heuer, and AMD.
The tall, thin capital letters of the Gap logo are so iconic that when they tried to change it in 2010, there was a public outcry that led the company to quickly change it back. The typeface is timeless and sophisticated.
Univers Extended gives a light, clean appearance to the FedEx logo. The wordmark places the letters closer together than the standard typeface so the arrow in the negative space can add a cool touch.
Didot is a dramatic, high-contrast serif font with a lot of variations. Like Bodoni, you can find it often in the fashion industry.
Proxima Nova combines the shapes of classic fonts and the proportions of modern fonts. Its look provides a happy medium between trustworthy traditional fonts and hip, modern fonts.
Neo Sans was one of the first typefaces to curve the corners on sans serif lettering. This technique gives it a softer, friendlier look than other sans serif fonts.
Helvetica is one of the most popular fonts in the world. It’s neutral, straightforward, and modern. Other companies that use the font in their logos include:
Some of the fonts on this list are free and others cost money to use. There are pros and cons of each that go beyond which ones you like and dislike.
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