Choosing fonts for titles: a plain-English guide

Serif fonts: trusted, editorial, thoughtful

Serifs (the small strokes at the ends of letters) feel like books and newspapers. Use them for essays, interviews, culture, finance and anything that should feel considered.

• Playfair Display: high-contrast and elegant, great for quotes and magazines.
• DM Serif Display: confident and warm.
• Cormorant Garamond: delicate and refined; use large.
• Fraunces: soft and characterful.
• Lora and Libre Baskerville: readable, classic book feel.

Sans-serif fonts: clean, modern, clear

Sans fonts feel direct and contemporary. They’re the safest choice for how-to content, tech, business and education.

• Inter and DM Sans: neutral and highly readable.
• Space Grotesk: slightly techy, with personality.
• Montserrat and Poppins: geometric and friendly; good at heavy weights.

Display fonts: loud on purpose

Display fonts are made for short, large text. They grab attention in a crowded feed.

• Anton, Bebas Neue and Oswald: tall and condensed, ideal for YouTube thumbnails and reels.
• Archivo Black: wide and heavy.
• Abril Fatface: dramatic and fashion-like.
• Fredoka: rounded and playful.

Handwritten: personal and casual

Permanent Marker gives a hand-drawn feel. Use it for a word or two, not a full sentence, and never on long titles.

Arabic and Malayalam

For Arabic titles, try Cairo (modern and clean), Tajawal (light and contemporary) or Noto Kufi Arabic (geometric and bold). Arabic is written right to left, joins letters and shouldn’t be letter-spaced; itistitle handles all three automatically.

For Malayalam, Noto Sans Malayalam covers the full script. You can mix scripts in one title, for example an Arabic or Malayalam headline with an English subtitle, and each line is set in the right direction.

A simple rule for pairing

Use one expressive font for the title and a quiet one for everything else. In itistitle the subtitle uses Inter so it never competes. If you add extra text layers, pick one of the same family as your title, or a plain sans.