The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
Calibri vs Cambria
Two Microsoft ClearType fonts, released together with Windows Vista and Office 2007 and both tuned for on-screen reading. Calibri is a soft humanist sans-serif that served as Office's default for 17 years, while Cambria is a sturdy transitional serif built as a body-text alternative to Times New Roman.
Calibri is a commercial font, so it is shown here in Carlito, its closest free alternative. All free alternatives to Calibri → Cambria is a commercial font, so it is shown here in Merriweather, its closest free alternative. All free alternatives to Cambria →
The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
- Calibri, by Lucas de Groot, is a humanist sans with subtly rounded stems and corners and a true italic, giving it a soft, informal feel.
- Cambria, by Jelle Bosma, pairs heavy vertical serifs with thin horizontals in a slightly condensed, blocky structure that holds up at small sizes on low-resolution screens.
- Calibri was Office's default font from 2007 until Aptos replaced it in January 2024, so it reads as 'default document'; Cambria was never the default and feels more deliberately editorial.
- Cambria ships with Cambria Math, the first font to implement the OpenType math table, making it the standard choice for equations in Word.
- Both are proprietary Microsoft fonts bundled with Windows and Office but not freely licensed for other operating systems or the web, so cross-platform or web use means paying for a license or switching to Google's metric-compatible Carlito and Caladea.
Calibri
Reach for Calibri when you want a plain, friendly sans for everyday documents, slides, and email that will look the same on any Office install.
Cambria
Reach for Cambria for long on-screen reading, reports, and anything with equations, where its serif rhythm and Cambria Math give it the edge.