What are the best fonts for business websites?

There's no single best font, but there are plenty of bad choices: script fonts for body text, six different typefaces on one page, grey text in a thin weight that disappears on a phone. A good business website usually uses one or two well-made, readable fonts, and spends its personality elsewhere.

Which fonts work well for business websites?

All of these are free on Google Fonts and designed to read well on screens:

A solicitor might pair Merriweather headings with Source Sans 3 body text for a traditional but clear feel. A café might use Lato throughout and let the photos do the talking.

There are also system fonts, the ones already on people's devices, like Arial, Georgia and Verdana. They load instantly because nothing needs downloading. They're less distinctive, but perfectly respectable.

How do I pair fonts?

1. Pick your body font first. It does most of the work, so readability wins.
2. If you want a second font, use it only for headings, and make it clearly different, such as a serif heading with a sans serif body.
3. Stop at two. A third font almost always looks messy.
4. Use weight and size for hierarchy, rather than adding more typefaces: bold for headings, regular for text.
5. Check the pair alongside your logo. If your logo uses a distinctive typeface, a calm body font lets it stand out.

What size and spacing should text be?

1. Body text of around 16 pixels or larger. That's the usual default in browsers, so going smaller makes your site harder to read than most.
2. Line height of roughly 1.5 times the font size, so lines don't feel cramped.
3. Lines of a comfortable length on desktop. Very wide paragraphs are tiring to read.
4. Enough contrast between text and background. Dark grey or near-black on white is safest. Our guide to choosing website colours explains contrast ratios.

How do fonts affect speed?

Every font file, and every weight of it, is something the browser has to download. A site loading four fonts in five weights each can be noticeably slower on mobile.

1. Load only the weights you use. Regular and bold are often enough.
2. Use a variable font if one is available. One file can cover many weights.
3. Set font-display: swap so visitors see text straight away in a fallback font while yours loads, rather than a blank space.
4. Consider self-hosting fonts, which also keeps visitor data away from a third party.

Our guide to testing website speed shows how to see whether fonts are slowing your pages.

What should I avoid?

• Script or handwriting fonts for anything longer than a word or two.
• All capitals for paragraphs, which are harder to read.
• Light or thin weights for body text.
• Different fonts on different pages. Consistency is part of looking professional, which is why fonts belong in your brand style guide.

Readable fonts are also part of an accessible site. Our website accessibility checklist covers the rest.

Related guides: What is a brand style guide?, What is brand identity?.