My Favorite Fonts and Foundries for Digital Product Design
Date
Aug 6, 2025
Category
Design
Reading Time
8 Minutes
Fonts aren’t just decoration—they shape usability, mood, and brand identity. Here are the foundries and typefaces I return to again and again for digital product design.
Typography is one of those things that often feels invisible when it’s done well—but when it’s done poorly, everyone notices. For me as a product designer, fonts are more than just style; they’re a core part of how a product feels, communicates, and converts.
Over the years, I’ve built up a personal collection of typefaces and foundries I keep coming back to. Each has its own strengths, quirks, and use cases—whether it’s for e‑commerce, SaaS dashboards, or a fresh new startup identity. Below, I’ll share some of my favorite fonts and foundries, and why they’ve earned a place in my toolkit. (I’ll add specific names and examples later.)
Why Fonts Matter in Product Design
Clarity first – A font’s primary job is to be readable. If a user struggles to read, they’ll struggle to use your product.
Tone of voice – Typography sets the mood. A bold geometric sans communicates differently than a warm humanist serif.
Scalability – In digital products, type needs to work from tiny labels all the way up to hero headlines.
Brand identity – Fonts can carry as much brand weight as color palettes or logos.
What I Look for in a Good Typeface
When I evaluate a font for product design, I usually check:
Legibility across devices – from high‑res Retina screens to budget Android phones.
Full character sets – multilingual support is a must for global products.
Consistency across weights – Regular, Medium, Bold, and beyond need to be well balanced.
Variable font support – more flexibility, less code overhead.
Licensing – fair, transparent pricing that fits the client’s scale.
My Go-To Foundries and Fonts
Here’s a selection of foundries and typefaces I regularly use and recommend. Each one has its own character, and I’ll usually match them to projects depending on whether we’re optimizing for conversion, trust, or creativity.
Free or Open Source Fonts
Figtree
A clean, modern sans available on Google Fonts; great for product UIs and easy to implement anywhere.
Aspekta
An open‑source typeface on GitHub with a balanced design for both text and display use.
Geist (Vercel Font)
Vercel’s own open font, optimized for digital products and developer‑centric design systems.
Satoshi
A versatile, geometric sans from Fontshare that feels contemporary yet timeless.
Harmony
A free display typeface from Behance, useful for standout headlines and expressive branding.
Space Grotesk
A modern, proportional sans from Google Fonts, excellent for digital interfaces and editorial work.
Plus Jakarta Sans
A versatile, open‑source font designed for clarity and usability, great for UI and branding.
Outfit
A geometric sans serif from Google Fonts, elegant yet practical, with variable font support.
Lexend
A font family designed to improve reading speed and accessibility, ideal for inclusive product design.
Switzer
A contemporary sans serif from Fontshare, versatile for both text-heavy layouts and bold digital branding.
Paid Fonts
Nudica
A refined, modern typeface with excellent balance between aesthetics and usability, ideal for editorial and digital product design.
Britti Sans
A premium quality sans serif with a polished feel, perfect for production-ready branding and UI work.
Neue Corp
A sharp and contemporary sans serif, flexible for both branding and functional product design.
Graphik
A widely used, professional-grade sans serif with a large family of weights and multilingual support.
Circular
A modern classic geometric sans, trusted by global brands for its warmth and precision.
Diagramm
A bold and structured typeface, well-suited for editorial design and impactful digital experiences.
Founders Grotesk
A distinctive sans serif family with strong personality, widely used for branding and editorial design.
Neue Haas Unica
A revival of a classic, combining the best qualities of Helvetica and Univers with a contemporary twist.
Favorite Foundries
Atipo Foundry – creators of refined, modern typefaces like Nudica, offering high-quality fonts with approachable licensing.
Pangram Pangram – known for sharp, contemporary sans serifs like Neue Corp, popular with branding and digital design teams.
TypeType – a versatile foundry with a wide selection of fonts optimized for usability and multilingual support.
ALT TF – an independent foundry pushing expressive and experimental type design with a strong modern edge.
When to Experiment (and When Not To)
Typography is also a place for experimentation. A slightly unusual font choice can set a product apart—when used thoughtfully. But I also believe in knowing where not to take risks: core UI elements, checkout flows, and accessibility-critical areas should always lean toward safe, proven typefaces.
Conclusion
Fonts aren’t just decoration; they shape how users feel and interact with a product. The right font choice can make a product feel intuitive, trustworthy, and modern. The wrong one can break it completely.
In future posts, I’ll go deeper into specific typefaces and show examples of how I’ve used them in real projects. For now, these are my go-to fonts and foundries that keep inspiring my design work.
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