When we are talking about Apache server or MariaDB or WordPress, we do not have any fear of getting prosecuted. We can develop products without paying any fees, virtually without reading their licensing terms, and we can claim ourselves as “experts” after developing a significant amount of skill. Even we charge our clients for downloading and installing the products.
Adding a GNU GPL license itself hardly adds a “moral policy”. Along with that, recognition by the prominent sites which discuss GNU GPL-licensed software is better to mention them. This article tried to list some fonts which are delivered by the developers/artists with a GNU GPL-compatible license.
Free to use fonts with a copyleft license when combined with some other font, the combination comes under the copyleft license. That is called OFL. Free-to-use Fonts without a copyleft license when released as non-free font becomes a public domain font. Fonts released under an Apache 2.0 license are essentially the same as those licensed under GNU GPL 2.0 license. Also, read – What is the Difference Between Apache License 2.0 and GNU GPL 3.0.
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Generally, a Public Domain license is risky and unpredictable. OFL fonts are of premium quality but you should read the terms or some other notes. Well-known Fonts with GNU GPL or Apache licenses are risk-free. SIL OFL is risk-free, but you should read this FAQ:
1 | https://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?site_id=nrsi&id=OFL-FAQ_web |
This license does not allow to sell the fonts.
Google fonts include all these four types plus many others. Unless you know the exact license, you can not safely use your product’s packages.
List of GPL Compatible Fonts
GNU FreeFont is a family of free, open-source fonts from the GNU Project, licensed under the GNU GPL license. The family consists of FreeMono, FreeSans, and FreeSerif.
1 | https://www.gnu.org/software/freefont/ |
The list of fonts with GNU GPL license is too big to list here. This website listed them (we have not verified):
1 | https://fontlibrary.org/en/search?license=GNU%20General%20Public%20License&order= |
These fonts come with an Apache 2.0 license. All of these are safe.
Noto Sans Basic (Regular + Italic + Bold + Bold Italic)
NOTO SERIF BASIC (REGULAR + ITALIC + BOLD + BOLD ITALIC) Monotype Imaging Inc. 4 styles
DROID ARABIC KUFI Ascender Corporation 2 styles
DROID PERSIAN NASKH Ascender Corporation
DROID ARABIC NASKH Ascender Corporation 2 styles
PASSAGEWAY Ascender Corporation 2 styles
GERMANO Ascender Corporation 4 styles
AJAR SANS Ascender Corporation 5 styles
KAKA Ascender Corporation
ROBOTO MONO Google 10 styles
ROBOTO Google 12 styles
ROBOTO OLD Google 18 styles
ROBOTO CONDENSED Google 6 styles
ROBERTO SANS Google 12 styles
FRANZO Google 4 styles
FONT OF PRIMALIS Google 12 styles
ROBOTO CONDENSED Google 6 styles
ROBOTO 1 Google 12 styles
ASIMOV Google 17 styles
LORENZO SANS Intel Corporation 6 styles
CLEAR SANS Intel Corporation 8 styles
CLEAR SANS Intel Corporation 8 styles
THRUMS SERIF REGULAR hyperdata.it
COUSINE Monotype Imaging Inc. 4 styles
SINKIN SANS K-Type 18 styles
ROCKETFUEL Cannot Into Space Fonts. 2 styles
PROFAISAL-ELITE-RIQA Original by Jamil-ur-Rahman and Astigmatic, Merged by Faisal Abbas
PROFAISAL-ELITE-TAHREER Original by Jamil-ur-Rahman and Astigmatic, Merged by Faisal Abbas
CALADEA Carolina Giovagnoli and Andres Torresi 4 styles
Conclusion
Google, IBM, Intel and Ascender Corp are among the few companies which changed the scenario of fonts. Now we have a lot of good-looking fonts suitable to design a modern UI or product description. As because we are not lawyers, for printing product labels, you probably should discuss with a lawyer.
