The best typewriter fonts for your designs, from vintage classic to more modern typefaces.
(Image credit: Nora Carol Photography via Getty Images)
Typewriter fonts are a great way to add character and texture to your projects. Whether you're going for a classy vintage feel, or fancy adding a playful edge to your design these retro typefaces are a perfect way to add a unique visual appeal to your work. Courier may be the most famous typewriter font, but there are plenty of others out there to explore.
Ranging from distressed grungy styles to clean contemporary options, there's a diverse range of typewriter fonts to suit any project. If you're after a broader selection, check out our collection of the best free fonts and for some design inspiration, check out our guide to the best font pairings for some stylish combinations to level up your designs.
Buy fonts from myfonts.com Several of the fonts in our selection of the best typewriter fonts below can be purchased at Myfonts.com by Monotype. The site boasts over 130,000 fonts, including more than 900 free options.
Kicking off our list is this romantic typewriter font created by Dixie's Delights. Love Letter's delightfully imperfect effect gives it a rustic feel that gives your projects a comforting vintage style, perfect for adding a sentimental human touch.
Love Letter harks back to a time when typewriters were used to spill out our feelings for our loved ones. Reach for this most amorous of free typewriter fonts if you want to put a bit of old school passion into your designs.
CarbonType is a stylish grungy font that's scanned directly from letters produced by a Samsonite typewriter. It gives any project an authentic vintage feel that's effortlessly cool and the best thing is, it's completely free to use. Use it for posters and projects that need a bit of edge.
03. Thesis Typewriter
Typewriter fonts: you can almost hear the clacking of this one (Image credit: Ana Parracho)
Thesis Typewriter font comes in three different styles (Weary, Regular and Bold) meaning it'll suit a multitude of projects. The cost of the Thesis Typewriter is $15/£9.99 for one of the three, but if you buy all three in a family package it's just $18/£12.99.
04. Detective
Detective combines old-fashioned charm with modern sensibilities (Image credit: Inspirationfeed)
The Detective typewriter font is a moody and nostalgic typeface perfect for projects that require an element of mystery. What we like about this font is the fact that not all the letters are uniformly straight, meaning it gives an authentic and playful feel to your project. The font has been reduced from $17 to $13.60, so make sure you move quickly to bag yourself a great font at a great price.
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05. FF Trixie
If a grungy typewriter feel is what you're after, you can't go wrong with Trixie
Now if you're looking for a versatile typewriter font, then Trixie is the typeface for you. There are 12 different variations of fonts in the Trixie family, meaning that whatever the project, there's a Trixie font suitable for it. This is a font suited to a higher budget as individual fonts costs either £39 or £59. You can of course splash out on the whole family for £588.
While this grungy font may seem a little pricey, it is definitely worth every penny; Trixie has apparently had quite the history, what with it being created in Nuremberg in the 1930s and its 'mother font' being Triumph Durabel.
06. Letter Gothic
This typewriter-style font was designed for IBM (Image credit: URW Type Foundry)
Typewriter fonts aren't all about creating the distressed uneven ink look. Roger Roberson designed the sleek Letter Gothic for IBM in the early '60s. It has flat monospaced sans serif lettering, which is clean and beautiful. This cleaner typewriter typeface is available in a variety of different weights.
07. Scripter Serif
Another one of the cleaner typewriter fonts around (Image credit: Typia nesia)
Price: Requires Envato subscription: $16.50 per month
Here's another nice and clean typewriter font, but this one's a serif. It's highly legible, making it more suitable for logo and branding work but still has a clear typewriter feel. The clean lines make it feel more modern, so it's not necessarily one for creating a vintage look, but more the timeless elegance offered by a typewriter typeface.
08. Olivetti Typewriter
Olivetti is great for mimicking the sloppy ink effect of older machines
Created by designer Iza W, this classic typewriter font is great for mimicking the sloppy ink effect of older typewriter machines. Available in five different weights, Olivetti is a great option for a traditional typewriter style.
A version of the classic Courier font, Courier M is a typewriter typeface that was designed by Howard Kettler in 1956. Released by font foundry URW, it's a clean, classic lightweight typewriter font.
10. Colón Mono
Colón Mono was influenced by the aesthetic of a typewriter
A monospaced slab serif type family, Colón Mono was created by architect and graphic designer Ramiz Guseynov. It comes in two weights of roman and alternative styles and matching italics respectably.
11. Erased Typewriter 2
A distressed font, Erased Typewriter great for creating authentic feel
Erased Typewriter 2 is a distressed font from type designer Paulo W. It's great for creating an authentic type feel. You can customise your designs with a choice of four weights: regular, bold, italic and underscore.
12. LTC Remington Typewriter Pro Set
This light weight typewriter font is beautiful and classical
LTC Remington Typewriter Pro is a beautiful classic lightweight typewriter font with a hint of class and unconventional characteristics in the letterforms. Far removed from the traditional bulky ink spilt typewriter style, this clean alternative is a great way to combine a hint of classic design with more technological visuals.
13. IHOF Typewriter
P22 typewriter font is based on type found in old German documents
The P22 typewriter font was based on a typeface originally used in a document for a German type conference. Striking a balance between distress and clean legibility, it offers myriad uses. There's also now an underlined variant.
14. Intimo
This typewriter font cleverly uses dots to create an unique look (Image credit: Gareth Hague)
Intimo is quite a unique alternative typewriter font, that blend the simplicity of dots with typewriting stains. It offers something a bit different while retaining effortless readability and a nice visual effect in various sizes.
15. Aminta
This quirky typewriter font takes cues from other type families
Typography designer Gareth Hague's Aminta Regular is a beautiful cross between the originality and depth of the typewriter courier classic and a sophisticated Helvetica touch added to create a modern balance. Designed and inspired by a series of drawing and handwriting experiments, it offers creatives an alternative lightweight serif font. Aminta Black is also a nice option as a more dominating version closer to the classic typeface of a traditional typewriter but still with a cleaner and more modern finish. The close proximity of the letters can make it look like someone has repeatedly pressed a key when the carriage is stuck!
16. Grandpa's Typewriter
Grandpa's Typewriter is great if you need a really distressed old typewriter look
If you want a really worn, smudgy old typewriter look for grainy or superimposed type, then Grandpa's Typewriter is a creative option. Designer Eduardo Recife based this five-font family on an antique Olivetti, and he includes all the effects you get from an old typewriter machine. There's a regular version, a strong hit version, a light distressed version, a double-hit version and intriguingly an X version, which is a compilation of typewriter mistakes, tests and stains. It's great for designs that require a distressed grungy look.
17. EF Mono
Distressed look gives this typewriter typeface an interesting style
Designed by Ilko Höppin for the Elsner + Flake design studio, this is another playful alternative to the classic Courier typewriter font. The cutout effect and distorted lettering offer an interesting visual dynamic.
18. EF Techno Script
By contrast to Mono, above, this is a crisp, clean typewriter typeface
Another example brought to us by the Elsner + Flake design studio, Techno Script combines clean-cut digital elements with the typewriter aesthetic for a style that wouldn't look out of place in more modern applications.
19. Firenza
The Firenza fonts are based on a design that was in use at the turn of the 19th century
Based on a design used at the turn of the 19th century, the Firenza font family has character shapes that resemble those which became common on typewriters throughout the second half of the 20th century. Each weight has a full character set of 232+ letterforms, with all characters designed in the style of the font.
20. Chapter 11
Chapter 11 typewriter font is based on governmental typefaces
Chapter 11 is the perfect font if you're looking for an authentic typewriter feel redolent of official classified government papers and the like. Designed by Canadian typographer Rebecca Alaccari, it's a great typeface to use when you want to get creative with a more organic typewriter style.
Moms Typewriter is a great font for adding an authentic grungy appeal to your projects. Created by Christoph Mueller, this custom typeface was created from scans of an original old typewriter. In his own words: I just typed the whole alphabet on my mom’s old typewriter, scanned it, and made the font," Christoph says. Moms Typewriter is completely free to use for personal and commercial use.
Designer Andrew Hart has a ton of free fonts, all of which are available on his website. But we particularly like this fanciest of free typewriter fonts. Free for personal use, the download includes a full set of upper and lower case letters, numbers and special characters.
What font looks most like a typewriter?
While there are plenty of creative typewriter fonts available, the most generic option is Courier or Courier New. This font is found on most word processors and features the familiar, retro serif style typography that we often associate with typewriter fonts.
Courier New was specifically designed to emulate the style of a typewriter, featuring a slab serif style with a monospace design.
If you'd like to learn more, check out our jargon-free Font vs typeface guide. For more font inspiration, check out the stunning Fortnum and Mason fonts that are a classytribute to British typographic history.
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Kerrie Hughes is a frequent contributor to Creative Bloq, and was once its editor. One of the original CB crew, Kerrie joined the team back in 2013 after moving from her role as staff writer on 3D World. Since then she's written regularly for other creative publications such as ImagineFX, Computer Arts and Digital Camera World. After a stint working for the police, Kerrie is back reviewing creative tech for creative professionals.
