

It was not only one of the most popular fonts in the 20 th century, but remains that to this day. The name Helvetica means Swiss in Latin, and it was named that way due to its Swiss designer. Firstly, it was known as the Neue Haas Grotesk but was renamed to Helvetica later. Helvetica is a neo-grotesque font with a realist design, designed by Max Miedinger, a Swiss typeface designer. This means that there are many fonts similar to Helvetica out there.

Since it came out, many people tried to recreate what Helvetica does none have been as famous as it is. It has that neutral quality which makes it a good starting point for many designers. The Helvetica font has been around since 1957 and has passed the test of time on numerous occasions, which can be seen in the number of times it appears in designs nowadays. It is known as an enduring font that is capable of doing just about anything. Helvetica is a Linotype font.Helvetica is one of the most popular fonts out there. Bitstream's Swiss 721, for example, is very similar to Helvetica, but at first glance (and that's as far as I have got), the license is a little less restrictive.Ī quick email to the font forge might be easier than reading the license. It may be that other fonts have less restrictive licenses.

You might also want to have a look at Helvetica Neue: The Ugly Truth, which describes how some browsers have trouble rendering your designer's font of choice. So although you could buy one of the Helvetica variants for around $30, you might not be able to use it on the web site. The fonts hosted by Google and others tend to be chosen because they have an open license.įonts like Helvetica have fairly strict commercial licenses.

However, you need check the font license very carefully. You can host fonts on your server, and use the CSS rule to display those fonts on your web site.
