Minimalist web designs used in conjunction with plain font styles create stunning designs through simplicity. However, some designs call for a more witty approach, and those same plain font styles just wouldn’t do the trick. These light-hearted, witty designs work best with “fun” font styles.
Fun fonts are a lot less serious than the average sans or script fonts. They may not be something you’d use in a design for a high-end fashion site or a photographer’s site, but they’re perfect for businesses and blogs that have huge personalities built on light-hearted or even comical marketing styles.
Fun fonts also tend to have a more striking appeal than typical fonts, grabbing a reader or social media user’s attention as soon as he sees it. This makes them ideal for logos and image ads where the right font can really grab a company’s target market’s attention.
How to Incorporate Fun Fonts into Web Designs
Check out this screenshot from Dollar Shave Club’s home page. The company took off after its founder published a low-budget, comedy-filled viral video on YouTube in 2012. As you can see from the screenshot above, it uses non-traditional font styles to get its message across in the same straightforward approach its initial video used.
You can incorporate these types of fonts with marketing tactics inside of Divi. This theme comes with the highly-rated Divi Builder plugin that allows you to create custom email forms, blurb modules, and sliders. Using these types of fonts within one of these modules would make for a great way to grab a reader’s attention and get him to convert as she browses your site.
Take it from the Slides That Rock slideshow on Slideshare – eye-catching fonts, especially when used with comical images, are great ways for companies with unprofessional personas to create bold slideshow presentations with messages that stick and convert.
Plus, there’s no easier way to insert a stunning slideshow that works with your design, as opposed to embedding one through Slideshare, on your site than to use the slider module built right into Divi!
Developing various designs for the various marketing styles that exist in the business and blogging world are challenges all web designers struggle with. Allow us to simplify those challenges by giving you a list of examples of fun fonts you can incorporate into your next web design project.
Some of these fonts have premium versions while others are available free of charge. We’ll also give you a heads up on whether or not these fonts can be used in end products in case you or your clients intend to sell what you create. Let’s get started!
Free Fun Fonts
GoodDog by Fonthead Design
GoodDog is a hand-drawn font produced by Fonthead Design. It has over 1.8 million downloads on Font Squirrel. It’s a simple font, but it’s a simplicity that differs from sans or serif fonts. The font appears jagged and uneven, but this is what gives it its fun and lighthearted appeal that would work best for a casual lifestyle brand or blog. The font is licensed under the standard End User License Agreement version 1.00 that grants the user permission to use the font in an end product so long as the font is not used as the main marketing aspect of the product, such as a slogan on a t-shirt.
Amatic by Vernon Adams
Amatic is a hand-drawn font designed by Vernon Adams. The font has over 1.7 million downloads on Font Squirrel. It’s fairly similar to GoodDog, but uses all uppercase lettering. This font comes with a medium-sized set of glyphs, but a webfont version must be generated through Font Squirrel’s Webfont Generator. The font is licensed under the SIL Open Font License version 1.1, which allows it to be used personally and commercially for most uses so long as the font is not sold by itself. Like GoodDog, this font would complement the look and feel of a casual lifestyle brand or blog quite well.
Intro Rust by Fontfabric
This is a “grunge” style font by Fontfabric. It has over 145,000 downloads on Font Squirrel. It uses all uppercase lettering, and each letter features a rusted appearance. This gives it a bold look that would catch the eye of any site visitor, especially when used to create a simple sales copy phrase similar to the phrase on Dollar Shave Club’s home page, as depicted above. The font comes with typical glyphs. It’s licensed under the Fontspring Desktop/Webfont License version 1.30, which grants the user permission to use it in most end products. The font’s EULA is quite long and descriptive, so I suggest reading through it carefully if you wish to use it for permission purposes.
Snickles by Tup Wanders
Snickles is a hand-drawn font that looks as though it was drawn using a permanent marker or felt pen. The font has over 104,000 downloads on FontSpace. The designer states the font “looks like the kind of font a shopkeeper would make with a marker to sell stinky fish and stale bread.” It’s available for commercial use, but keep in mind it’s licensed under the Creative Commons (by) Attribution license.
Michael by mysunday
Michael is a dingbat, script font by mysunday. The font has the look and feel of a connected script font but features curly tails and “flowy” letters that give it a spirited yet striking appearance, perfect for lifestyle brands, food brands, and even writer websites. The font is available for $12 at Fontspring with a Fontspring Desktop Font EULA version 1.6.0. This grants you permission to use it for multiple commercial uses, though it cannot be used to create an end product shaped like letters, such as stickers. It cannot be used by anyone other than the person listed on the receipt. The font comes with typical glyphs and webfont versions.
Splandor by ilhamherry
Splandor is a vintage, hand-drawn font by ilhamherry. The fonts feature playful designs with plenty of bends and waves, giving them a vintage look and feel that would work best as a logo or title image. The font can be purchased for $15 at Creative Market, which grants the user permission to use it for commercial purposes. However, you’ll need to purchase the Extended License for $75 to be able to use it in end products. It comes with the font as well as an ornament pack available as .AI vector files in Adobe CS3.
Le Gourmet by Imagi Type Co.
Le Gourmet is a “handmade font family consisting of 3 fonts made with ink and a brush.” As suggested by its name and how the designer recommends using the font, this font works best when incorporated into a food menu given its casual yet bold and playful appearance. The Standard License is available for $15 at Creative Market, which grants permission for most commercial uses. The Extended License, or the end-product license, is a little steep at $150. All three font types can be considered “fun,” and all three should be used with one another to create a spectacular menu, whether online or offline.
Banthers by Swistblnk Design Std.
Banthers is a handmade, mono-line display font that features a playful design with an elegantly striking appeal. The design may not be fun in an obvious sense as many of the designer’s examples look sleek, but the font’s many stylistic and ligature options make it versatile enough to suit a number of different design styles. The Standard License is available for $17 while the Extended License is available for $27. You’ll receive perhaps more options and design extras than any other font on this list. These include all of the typical glyphs you’d expect as well as OpenType features and alternate glyphs, which must be accessed inside of Adobe Illustrator CS and Adobe InDesign.
HMS Gilbert by Fenotype
HMS Gilbert is a hand-drawn script font by Fenotype that features a bit of a “sloppy” design, giving it a more casual and playful effect than typical script fonts. Each base font can be purchased for $35 each, but the entire 13-font family (pictured above) can be purchased for $149, though discounts are available from time to time. The designer has developed their own license for these fonts, which grants personal and commercial use for most products, including branding and logos. There are also plenty of webfont options.
Gin by Fort Foundry
Gin by Fort Foundry features a stunning vintage design that’s perfect for use in comical graphic designs meant to make messages stick with simple phrases. The Standard License is available for $45, but the Extended License gets pretty steep at $450. The font comes in four different styles, and stylistic alternates and ligatures can be accessed by enabling these options in the character panels of Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign.
Final Thoughts
There are plenty of fonts out there that let you create beautiful web designs, promotional images, and logos for professional customers, but those types of designs may not suit companies whose marketing strategies are built on bold, comical, and outspoken personas.
We hope these font suggestions have provided inspiration for your next web design project as well as a clearer understanding of how to create web designs tailored to your clients’ varied personalities.
What are some of your favorite fun fonts? Let us know in the comments below, and be sure to share your own tips on how to use these types of fonts in web design.
Thumbnail via Nikolaeva / shutterstock.com
superb list of fonts
thanks for the share
HI
I just loved reading your articles.
I’m glad I got your fun fonts list.these types of fonts are really useful for us.I will definitely check out most of the site asap.thanks for the fonts site list 🙂
A few hours ago I made a logo using Arial! Understand? Arial.. Now I have to start over, with these fonts which are, by the way, quite nice.
hello,
I loved your fonts
but I dint find how to use them
finally found the answer in the comments
thanks for the info
Also….
wpbeginner . com / wp-themes / how-to-add-custom-fonts-in-wordpress /
wpsites . net / web-design / fonts-wordpress /
Apparently any comment with a link in it goes straight to the moderation que….
Try again….
wordpress . org / plugins / use-any-font /
I’ve tried to post answers to the questions (as have some others that I saw before their comments were deleted) but apparently moderation (censorship!) is alive and well here. 🙁
I take that back…..clearly a cache issue on my end. 🙂
You can upload them to the server, and then reference them from the child theme stylesheet. Not that difficult.
Unfortunately, that is that is exactly the kind of non-answer that less-technical people keep getting. Plug-in aside, some people don’t know what folder to load them to on their site, or how to reference them. It would be helpful if there was a link to a “total-newbie tutorial” that goes step-by-step on how to install and implement downloaded fonts, with no assumption of any knowledge of the process. It took me a day of Googling and experimenting to add a fancy fun font to my site, and I’m still not sure how I did it was the best way.
The answer has already been spelled out here by myself and others. If you can’t read – you have bigger problems. 🙂
I’m always astounded how frequently questions on these posts are ignored and go unanswered.
Agreed, you would/might expect that the author is monitoring the post to answer these questions. Actually, if you come up with a post like there is a 100% guarantee you get these questions, so why not answer them right in the post.
That aside, even if someone replies to your comment, you are not being notified, so you have to check back yourself. It really frustrates me that there is no ‘subscribe to comments’ option here.
Yes, I at present I do not use other fonts with Divi I think because I lack the knowledge and hence the confidence I need to use them.
I have possible builds coming up where it would be desirable to use other fonts.
What about a post which sets out where to find different fonts, which work best with Divi/Extra and how to import and use them??
So… Has anyone found a way to install these yet?
I’m supposing @font-face in a custom CSS file would work, but where would we upload the font files?
There’s also a highly rated plugin with 80,000+ downloads. I haven’t checked it’s compatibility with DIVI. See it for yourselves: https://wordpress.org/plugins/use-any-font/
This is a good question (how to use them w/ Divi).
I know I’ve used Google fonts with an early version of Divi. You have to add some code to the “code” section in the options panel. I went to the Google Fonts help section and it gave me enough info that I was able to figure it out.
I’m not sure if all of the above are web fonts? If they are, there are probably instructions on the sites where you download them from, on how to use them in your website.
If they’re not web fonts, I don’t know what to say except add them to a graphic and then upload the graphic to use it in Divi.
I know that’s not much help, but since we don’t see anyone with more knowledge chiming in to answer this, I thought I’d share what little knowledge I have.
I think the plugin Use Any Font solves the problem.
Here’s the answer once and for all. It requires a plugin if you want to do it the easy way. There’s nothing Divi itself can do to make it easier.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/use-any-font/
For $10 you can import unlimited fonts.
I have no interest in the plugin monetarily or otherwise. I just know it works. 🙂
Here’s a more hands-on approach…
http://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-themes/how-to-add-custom-fonts-in-wordpress/
and
http://wpsites.net/web-design/fonts-wordpress/
“How to Incorporate Fun Fonts into Web Designs” Not to be critical but didn’t ready any “how” in this article… good over review of available fonts but nothing about “how to incorporate…” either generally or with ET…
Not to be critical either, but I believe the article’s purpose is to introduce these great fonts in designs as a way of thought and inspiration and not as a manual…
Title of 1st section “HOW to incorporate….”…. not much “HOW” in the article… maybe a rename of title to “Fun Fonts to Incorporate into Web Designs”…. Title should reflect the purpose of article.
you need to try something like the use any font plugin.
you need to try something like the use any font plugin.
Nick,
I think this is a step by step article that you guys should publish and even a tool to help users install custom font faces.
For everyone else that posted here I would recommend visiting
https://orangepulley.com/custom-fonts-in-divi/
I have this page on my bookmark list to copy font custom CSS from
like to know all of the above too!
I was looking for the same information. How do we import specialty fonts like these?
Does Divi offer a user friendly way to install our own fonts? I can see the fonts that are included within the theme by going to Theme Customizer… But there’s no documentation on how to add to these fonts.
Is there a directory within the Divi theme that we can add our own fonts into? Maybe within a child theme?
Or does this require the use of a plugin?
I’d rather this be included within Divi itself and I’d like for the fonts I add to be available within the Divi font drop down.
Is that possible?
You can use a plugin like Google Font Manager which adds a Font Family dropdown box to your text editor, and you can grab extra fonts from Googles online repository.
I appreciate this information BUT how does one use these fonts on the Elegant Themes?
I have asked this before but no answers
You don’t use them as a webfont, like Google Fonts. I think you’d just use them as a font in a graphic header or slider.
If the font provides a webfont package, you could host it and put in the CSS yourself, that that’s outside the scope the article, I think.
Yes, I’ve been wondering how to add fonts also.
+1
Chuck,
Typically fonts like this are used when creating your own images/graphics for a website and are not part of the website platform itself. Although I know The Google Fonts collection is giving a lot more freedom to web designers when it comes to website typography getting more creative then the usual standard fonts always offered. The fonts listed above would just be installed in your font folder to use with any graphics program.