Pairing Fonts – 3 effective ways to combine typefaces, from easy to advanced

💌 Pimp my Type Newsletter with weekly font recommendations:

📰 Corresponding article with images:

TL;DW: First, decide if you really need another typeface, have a reason for it. Decide on a base, then find something to combine it with. For a quick win, use type families that contain different styles (most sans-serif and serif), and are designed to fit together. Another quick win is going for a very diverse combination. The most advanced level is looking at a typeface’s construction and pair similar underlying designs. Most important: have fun while doing it!

Basic Principles

🤔 Do you really need more than one typeface? You can achieve a lot with only one typeface by using a different style, like a bold heading or an italic, or a display style.

🤔 Use as little different styles as possible! Repeat your font choices as often as you can, and only when something does not work in a given situation, add a new style.

🤔 Have a reason for another typeface! Some common cases are for titles, headings, or pull quotes; for captions, marginalia, small print, navigation or other UI components; or for code on your site.

Ways to find good typeface combinations

1️⃣ Use type families (easy)
A super quick win! Type families or super families are designed in different typographic styles (e.g. sans and serif) with the aim to fit together, like IBM Plex, Roboto, Adelle, Tisa, or Merriweather. Use them to have more variation, and they will work right out of the box!

2️⃣ Make it obviously different (medium)
Go for contrast: Pick a font for your titles, headings, lead-in paragraph, or pull quotes, that really stands out. Choose something that won’t get in the way of your regular body text, because it’s so different.

3️⃣ Look at the typeface’s construction (advanced)
I came up with the word “Megatypos” that contains very different letter to compare typefaces at a glance. Look at the letter forms (single-story or two-story a/g), apertures (is the inner space of the letter shapes more open or closed, see e, a, s) and the contrast (are the strokes even or contrasting)

⚠️ Popular Pairings on Google Fonts
Ignore them! They are clearly based on the popularity of a typeface, not if it’s a good combination. Most of the time they will misguide you and suggest combining a font with another from the same category (like sans-serif with sans-serif, which does not make a lot of sense).

🔠 Some cool featured fonts

ABC Arizona by Dinamo Typefaces (at 4:06)

The Questa Project by Martin Majoor and Jos Buivenga @exljbris (at 4:23)

Árida by Latinotype (at 6:12)

Chapters
00:00 Intro
01:32 Do you really need another typeface?
02:06 Use as litte fonts as possible
03:01 Have a reason for another typeface
03:35 Way 1: Use type families
05:25 Way 2: Make it obviously different
06:10 Way 3: Looking at the construction
09:25 About Google Fonts’ popular pairings
10:36 Summary & Outro
11:54 Outtakes

[johannesn]

this was an epic ending. recommendation to watch until the very last second! great job, Oliver!

[vistinaeo]

best thing I found in 2021 is your channel

[rutchkiwi]

Love this channel - just waiting for this to blow up as it's criminally under-watched!
I have a request for a video: bulleted lists/list styling in general. Idk if that's
strictly fonts but it's related and it's something I've really been struggling
with recently.

[andreacamargo]

OMG this is the first video that I'm seeing of Pimp my type and I'm really love it!

[TamaraBelair]

Very helpful video! Thanks for walking through what you look for in construction when choosing two complementary fonts (e.g., open shapes, uneven strokes, type of g / a etc.).

[doodlesnoodles]

I love everything about this video! Thank you so much for the information 🎉 This is amazing content

[julliana]

Very informative video! Thanks for sharing these tips. What about pairing fonts with logos? Could be a cool topic. 😊

[russianbacon]

struggling to pick fonts for my type for print class and this video is saving my life basically😭

[troymattson]

Thanks for the video Oliver! I love the video transitions.

[mathancreates]

Thank you ! as a fresher design student that helped a lot

[manzelo]

Very good man, it helped me a lot :D

[yellingbytes]

love this episode esp. the Megatypos trick. btw I guess you got the cup from denmark?

[YuriKravtsov]

Thank you for this video. Lets say I want to use a geometric grotesque like Montserrat or Geologica as heading but I can't use them as a body because they are not legible in small sizes. Also I wouldn't want to use a serifs as body typeface. What would you recommend as a pair for those kind of typefaces?

[ibrars.]

my man is p much ellen luptons brother. lol. amazing