Windows comes with a lot of fonts at your disposal. You can find appropriate fonts for everything from formatting an eBook to making invitations to a child’s birthday party. But, sometimes, you still want something a little bit extra. There’s a lot of choices fir custom fonts out there on the internet, but how do you download and install them on a Windows 10 PC?
Don’t worry, it’s easy to add that little bit of flair to your project. Let’s see how it works.
Safe Websites to Download Fonts
First of all, when finding a custom font for your project, you need to find a safe site to download from. Websites that offer free customization options for your PC sometimes use their downloads as a vessel for malware. You don’t want to download a font, only to find that a virus was packaged alongside it!
If you want some great websites to download fonts from, you can search for great and safe-to-download options on DaFont, Font Squirrel, and Urban Fonts. Remember, if you want to use these fonts in a project you intend to sell for money, make sure the font creator has allowed it for commercial use, or get permission from them before you use it.
How To Install Them
When you download a font, you’ll get one of two things; either a .ttf file or a .zip file. If you get a .zip file, it should have a .ttf file within it.
Once you get a hold of the .ttf file, you can do one of two things. The first is just to right-click the file and click Install. Easy!
The second is to double click the file. This will open up a special window that shows a preview of the font. This is particularly useful if you downloaded a font without checking how it looked, or if you completely forgot what it looked like! Sometimes you’ll see oddities in the font where the font designer added something different to what you might expect; for instance, this font is a free version with only the letters, and the rest are ‘locked’ until you buy the free version:
If you like what you see, simply click the ‘Install’ button at the top left. This will automatically put the font onto your system.
Remember, if you’re installing new fonts, you may need to restart any software you have open before it recognizes you’ve added the font!
Tomorrow, in part 2 of this series, we’ll look at how to manage your recently installed fonts.
~ Simon