I’ve recently discovered that Dafont (the huge free font site) allows registered users to create “selections” (which others might call “collections”). I can make whatever categories I want, and put whatever fonts I want to in those categories. So I’ve built a bunch of lists!
These lists are handy as heck when you’re looking for a free font for a personal project. (For most of the fonts at Dafont, they’re only free for personal use; be sure to check each font’s licensing information for details on how it can be used.)
These lists will always be growing and changing as I find new fonts to add to them. I’ve done some deep digging down to the bottom of the categories at Dafont, and hopefully these will help you discover some new favorites!
100% Free With License!
Fonts that are totally free for commercial use, with a license document included! (As of when I added them to this list; be sure to confirm documentation when downloading.) Curated to those fonts I find attractive and relatively well-made.
Holidays – Halloween Favorites
Bones, skulls, dripping blood, lightning, monsters, aliens, and lots of other fonts I felt were Halloweeny!
Holidays – Winter Favorites
Snow, stars, candy, cookies, and lots of other fonts with fun wintertime elements!
3-D and Shadow Fonts
Fonts with a 3-D effect, or a background shadow look.
8-Bit Favorites
Retro pixel-style fonts for a computer-from-the-1980s look!
Art Deco and Vintage
Font styles reminiscent of the 1910s, 1920s, and 1930s.
Big, Blocky, and Cool
Heavy and bold fonts with a more blockish and squared-off look, where the letter sometimes nestle into each other.
Bold Hand Sans
Heavy/bold sans-serif fonts with a handwritten flair.
Boy & Man Handwriting
Handwriting fonts with a more masculine feel.
Car Badges
A list of period and retro fonts reminiscent of the text styles on old car badges.
Chalkboards
Fonts that look like they were written with chalk.
Circus and Carnival
Highly decorative and embellished fonts, mostly serif or slab serif, in a style often linked to the circus or a carnival.
Collegiate – Slab Serif
The squared-off style associated with colleges, universities, and sports – slab serif style.
Collegiate – Sans-Serif
The squared-off style associated with colleges, universities, and sports – sans-serif style.
Collegiate – Outline
The squared-off style associated with colleges, universities, and sports – all of these have their own single, double, or triple outlines.
Color-Ins
Collected for the new trend – these fonts have embellished letters with parts that can be colored in!
Decorative Hella Cool
This one is a personal taste list – these are fonts with decorative elements and embellishments that I find cool.
Dotted Ends
Mostly handwritten, these fonts have dots or circles at the end points of the letters.
Drips
Letters with a dripping liquid look. Whether that’s blood or melting ice cream is up to you.
Dry Brush Fonts
Both script and print styles that look like they were made with a dry or semi-dry brush and ink.
Embellished Inside
Fonts with decorative embellishments (from dots to stars to swirls and flowers) inside the letters.
Engravers
Fonts with inline elements, or the look of having been engraved.
Fancy Pants Scripts
Calligraphy and Script fonts with fine lines and decorative embellishments.
Favorite Deep Cuts
Another personal taste list. These are fonts I think are really cool, but as of when they were added to the list, they were getting fewer than 5 downloads per day. Check them out for fonts that not everyone is using!
Geometric and Graphic
Fonts with geometric styles and sharp graphic elements.
Glossy, Bubbly, Groovy
Fonts with a glossy shine to them, fonts with a fat bubble-style look, and fonts that would fit in the 1970s.
Handwritten Serif
Serif fonts, drawn by hand. Most of these are on the narrower side, with lighter weights.
Heavy Caps Marker
Handwritten, bold, mostly all-caps fonts that look like they were drawn with a permanent marker.
Heavy Metal Bands
Just right for your metal band’s logo.
Hipster Heaven
A blend of vintage/retro, letterpress, and roughness. It’s the look all the bearded hipsters are tending toward these days!
Kidsy & Monocase
Fonts with kids in mind – both kids’ handwriting styles, and monocase/unicase fonts (where both uppercase and lowercase are the same height).
Letterpress Grunge
Fonts with a letterpress/stamped look, with grungy texture. Mostly sans-serif and slab, but there are a few script fonts in here too.
Monogrammy
Fonts that are either intentionally created to make monograms, or regular fonts that I thought had a good monogram look.
Monoline Cursive
Cursive/script fonts with a single line weight throughout.
Old-Timey Writing
Handwriting fonts in styles from the distant past.
Outlines and Inlines
Fonts consisting of an outline instead of a solid letter shape, and a few with an empty spot inside the strokes of the letters.
Pilsner Swashes
Used for beers and sports, these are mostly retro-ish script fonts with decorative swashes that connect to the end of a word and go under the letters.
Pirates
Mostly rough-edged serif fonts; not just for pirates, these can also pair with Old-Timey Writing!
Retro Scripts and Caps
Fonts reminiscent of the styles of text used in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s.
Salt Life Similars
The Salt Life company logo is distinctive, hand-written, and highly protected. These fonts have similar elements!
Sci-Fi Favorites
My personal favorite sci-fi style fonts. (Mostly wide sans-serifs.)
Sci-Fi Stripes
Science-fiction style fonts with a stripe-based element throughout the letters.
Signatures
Handwriting fonts with a casual, signature-style look.
Simpsons Fonts
Handwriting fonts with a style reminiscent of the logo for “The Simpsons” television show, and the art of Matt Groening.
Skinny Wides
Handwriting fonts that transition from a very skinny stroke to a very wide stroke in the same character.
Sleeks Sans for Pairing
Not sure what font to pair with a script font? Can’t go wrong with these clean, simple sans-serifs!
Smooth Brush Fonts
In contrast with the Dry Brush Fonts list, these are hand-written brush fonts with smoother outlines, collected with crafters and cutters in mind.
Standards with Character
Serif, slab serif, and sans-serif fonts with a little something extra or unusual that caught my eye.
Stencil Favorites
My personal favorite stencil-style fonts, with bridges connecting the counters to the space outside the letters.
Stitches
Fonts with stitches, thread-style looks, or embroidery-style looks.
Stuff on Squares
Fonts where the letters are all on squares or rectangles. (Includes Scrabble tile fonts.)
Tall Skinny Caps
Tall, narrow, handwritten, mostly light-weighted, mostly all-caps, mostly sans-serif fonts.
Tattoo Scripts and Caps
Both script fonts and upright caps fonts reminiscent of tattoos.
Trash Caps
All-caps fonts with a rough, messy, trashed look.
Western Faves
My favorite options for western and cowboy styles.
Wider Hands
Handwriting fonts with a wider stance, since so many handwriting fonts are tall and narrow.
Wood Look
Fonts that look like they’re made out of wood or trees.
Naughty Fonts (NSFW)
A not-safe-for-work list consisting of nudity, body parts, and biological functions; including a surprising number of “gentleman’s area” images.
Television, Film, and Pop Culture Font Styles
Be aware with these: most are only available for personal use, and it may be infringing to use them to duplicate a logo or other intellectual property.
Harry Potter: Fonts in the style of the Harry Potter books and movies.
Star Warsy and Treksy: Forgive me, my fellow geeks, for collecting both Star Wars and Star Trek styles into one collection.
Simpsons Fonts: Handwriting fonts with a style reminiscent of the logo for “The Simpsons” TV show, and the art of Matt Groening.
Disney Styles: Fonts reminiscent of various Disney properties.
Friends Fonts: Fonts in the style of the opening credits of the TV show “Friends.” Yes, there are several of them!
Fonts of Thrones: Fonts in the style of the logo for the “Game of Thrones” television show.