Fonts that support Hebrew
Open-license families with Hebrew and Latin drawn to work together: text sans and serifs, rounded and display designs.
Shalom
Hebrew is written from right to left with an alphabet of 22 consonants, five of which take a different form at the end of a word. It has no capital letters, and vowels are shown, when they are shown at all, by small points placed under and inside the letters. Everyday modern Hebrew is set without those points; children's books, poetry, prayer books and dictionaries use them.
Those facts shape what to look for. Because there is no upper and lower case, Hebrew letters sit at a single height, usually between the Latin x-height and cap height, and a good bilingual family balances the two scripts so that neither looks bigger on a shared line. Traditional Hebrew type has thick horizontals and thin verticals, the reverse of Latin; modern sans-serif Hebrew evens the strokes out. Decide whether your text is pointed. Vowel points and cantillation marks need precise positioning, and only some fonts support them fully.
Layout needs care too: set the direction of the text to right-to-left and test mixed lines with numbers and Latin words. The families below pair Hebrew with a Latin of matching weight, and their notes describe each according to its record.
-
Heebo
A Hebrew and Latin sans in nine variable weights, with Hebrew as its primary script.
-
Assistant
A Hebrew drawn as a contemporary companion to a humanist Latin sans, in seven weights.
-
Rubik
Hebrew, Arabic and Cyrillic with slightly rounded corners, variable from Light to Black.
-
Open Sans
Hebrew, added in 2021, in a humanist sans that is variable in weight and width.
-
Frank Ruhl Libre
A revival of a 1908 Hebrew text face with Latin, variable from Light to Black.
-
David Libre
A Hebrew book face with Latin letters and vowel points, in three weights.
-
Miriam Libre
A monolinear Hebrew and Latin sans, variable from Regular to Bold.
-
Arimo
Hebrew beside Greek and Cyrillic in four weights with italics.
-
Google Sans
Hebrew among 25 subsets, in four weights with italics.
-
Secular One
A Hebrew and Latin humanist sans in a single sturdy weight.
-
Fredoka
A rounded sans with a matching Hebrew alphabet, in five weights.
-
Bellefair
A light, fine-stroked serif with a matching Hebrew alphabet.
-
Suez One
A heavy display serif for Hebrew and Latin with wedge serifs.
-
Karantina
A tall, tightly condensed Hebrew and Latin display family in three weights.
Samples load a basic Latin subset of each family. Every family here carries an open license; its page states the terms and offers the original files.
Questions about fonts that support Hebrew
Do these fonts include Hebrew vowel points?
Support for niqqud varies by family, and cantillation marks are rarer still. Check the glyph section on a font's page, and test a pointed sentence, before using it for children's or liturgical text.
How do I set Hebrew correctly on a web page?
Add dir="rtl" and lang="he" to the element. The browser then lays the text out from right to left, while numbers and embedded Latin words still run left to right inside it.
Are these Hebrew fonts free for commercial use?
Yes. All of them are under the SIL Open Font License, which allows commercial use and embedding.