Skip to content
AdawatAdawat
العربية
Adawat

Best Free Arabic Fonts for Design

5 min read

The best free Arabic fonts for design depend on what you are making. Cairo, Tajawal and IBM Plex Sans Arabic suit websites and apps, Amiri and Noto Naskh Arabic suit long reading, and Reem Kufi, Aref Ruqaa and Lalezar give headings and logos more character. All of them are on Google Fonts and free under open licenses.

This guide is organised by style rather than a ranking, because the style tells you more than a number does. Every font named here is in the Arabic font previewer, which lists only families that really contain Arabic letters, so you can try each one with your own text before you decide.

Steps

Open the previewer in another tab and type your own name or title. Fonts look very different with real words than with sample text.

  1. 1

    Decide what the text is for

    Body text on a website, a heading, a logo and a social post all need different things. Body text needs clarity at small sizes; a logo needs character; a heading sits in between.

  2. 2

    Start from a style

    Use sans-serif for interfaces, Naskh for long reading, Kufi for a geometric look, Ruqaa for a handwritten feel, and display fonts only for short, large text. The sections below list good starting points for each.

  3. 3

    Try your real text

    Type your name, your shop name or a real sentence in the font previewer. Check that letters connect well and that the tall and low letters do not collide.

  4. 4

    Check the weights

    A family with several weights, such as Cairo, Tajawal or Noto Sans Arabic, gives you a regular weight for text and a bold one for headings. Use the weight selector and the “several weights only” filter.

  5. 5

    Test small and large

    Preview at 16 pixels and at 80. Some display fonts look excellent large and become hard to read in a paragraph.

  6. 6

    Copy the code or save an image

    For a website, press “Copy CSS” and paste the snippet. For a logo draft or a social post, download the text as a PNG, with a transparent background if you need one, and place it in your design.

Sans-serif fonts for websites and apps

Cairo is a contemporary family with matching Latin letters, available in many weights. Tajawal is a low-contrast, modern geometric typeface in seven weights. Almarai is clear and simple, with four weights. IBM Plex Sans Arabic is the Arabic companion of IBM Plex and pairs well with technical content. Noto Sans Arabic covers the script broadly in multiple weights and widths. Mada was inspired by road signage and keeps its shapes open at small sizes, and Vazirmatn is a simple, legible Persian and Arabic face.

Naskh fonts for reading

Amiri is a classical Naskh typeface for books and long text, revived from the style of early twentieth-century Cairo printing. Noto Naskh Arabic is a modulated Naskh design suited to text. Scheherazade New is a traditional Naskh, Mirza is a body-text Naskh with ligatures, and Markazi Text is another text face. Naskh fonts work well at paragraph sizes, where sans-serif designs can feel plain.

Kufi, Ruqaa and display fonts for headings and logos

Reem Kufi is based on early Kufic models, Kufam is a condensed face inspired by seventh-century Kufi inscriptions, and Noto Kufi Arabic is a simplified Kufi. Aref Ruqaa follows the Ruqaa calligraphic style. For headlines, Lalezar is a bold display face, Katibeh is a headline font based on Naskh with some Thuluth qualities, Rakkas and Jomhuria are strong display designs, and El Messiri is a curvy modern face inspired by Naskh. Use these for short text only.

Playful and handwritten styles

Lemonada is a friendly modern family, Marhey is a playful design with the feel of hand lettering, and Baloo Bhaijaan 2 is an approachable display face. Playpen Sans Arabic has a handwritten character. They suit children’s content, cafés and casual posts, and are rarely the right choice for official documents.

Licenses in one paragraph

The fonts in the previewer are from Google Fonts and are open source. Almost all use the SIL Open Font License, which allows personal and commercial use and embedding on websites. Each card links to the font’s own license page. If you redistribute a font file, keep its license with it.

Common problems

  • Letters look disconnected or in the wrong order

    The text direction is probably left to right. In a design app switch the paragraph to right-to-left, and on a web page set dir="rtl" and lang="ar" on the element.

  • The font does not appear on my website

    Check that the link or @import is in the head, that the family name in your CSS matches exactly (in quotes if it has spaces), and that your Content Security Policy allows fonts.googleapis.com and fonts.gstatic.com.

  • The bold weight looks synthetic

    Your page asked for a weight the link did not include. Add the weights you use, such as 400 and 700, to the Google Fonts URL.

  • The page loads slowly with the font

    Load only the weights you need, add the preconnect tags from the copied snippet, and use font-display: swap, which the Google Fonts URL already includes.

Add Text to Image

Frequently asked questions

Which Arabic font is best for a website?

A sans-serif family with several weights, such as Cairo, Tajawal, IBM Plex Sans Arabic or Noto Sans Arabic, is the safest choice for interfaces and body text.

Can I use these fonts commercially?

Yes in almost all cases: they are open-source fonts, mostly under the SIL Open Font License. Check the license link on each font’s card for the exact terms.

How do I use an Arabic font in Word or Canva?

In Word, download the font family from Google Fonts, install it on your computer and restart Word. Canva has its own font library, so check it first; otherwise, download the text as a PNG from the previewer and place it as an image.

Related guides