Google Fonts

Font Hosting

Google Fonts is a convenient way to add fonts to your website, but it also helps Google to track your visitors and violate their privacy. That’s why Google provides the service, because they are a profit-making company whose business model depends entirely on tracking people online.

If you value your visitors’ privacy, switch to a privacy-friendly alternative.

Self-hosted fonts

Self-hosted fonts

You don’t need to use an external service at all. You can host your site’s fonts yourself and refer to them in the page’s code.

There are many free open fonts which you can legally download, host and use on your own site without payment.

Most font download sites have a mixture of non-free and free fonts, so make sure you check each font’s licence before using it on your site. The ones you want are labelled “GPL”, “OFL” or “Public Domain”.

Also, you don’t actually have to use Google Fonts to use its fonts, because they are under free licences anyway. There’s an unofficial site which makes it as easy as possible to download these fonts and self-host them instead.


System fonts

System fonts

Alternatively, a site can use the system fonts already built into visitors’ computers or phones.

System fonts never leave the user’s device, so they cannot violate privacy and do not use their internet connection.