The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
Free font
Crimson Pro
A free alternative to Caslon.
About Crimson Pro
Crimson Pro is Sebastian Kosch's old-style book serif, released in 2018 and tuned for screen reading rather than historical literalism. It sits in the Garalde tradition — humanist warmth, a moderate x-height, measured contrast, and a comfortable text color across a full variable weight range. Kosch cites Tschichold, Slimbach, and Hoefler as influences, and the result keeps a genuinely bookish, sixteenth-century flavor while rendering cleanly at digital sizes.
As a free alternative it does the work of several licensed book faces at once. It stands in for Garamond and Caslon where their humanist warmth matters more than a faithful revival, and it is arguably the strongest free option for long-form body copy that would otherwise default to Minion or Sabon. Plantin and Tiempos settings work too — Crimson runs slightly more bookish than Tiempos, but its reading-first construction holds up in the same editorial text roles.
- Designer
- Sebastian Kosch
- Released
- 2018
- Available at
- Google Fonts →
- Featured on
- 6 paid font pages
Crimson Pro is also a free alternative to…
- Caslon → Modern old-style serif drawn for screen reading. Captures Caslon's humanist warmth and moderate x-height with letterforms tuned for digital legibility — the right pick when historical literalism matters less than screen rendering.
- Garamond → Modern old-style serif designed for screen reading. Captures Garamond's humanist warmth and moderate x-height, with letterforms tuned for digital legibility — a good choice when historical literalism matters less than screen rendering.
- Minion Pro → Built explicitly in the old-style book tradition of Minion and Sabon, with a full variable weight range and comfortable text color. Arguably the best free choice for long-form body copy where Minion would otherwise be the default.
- Plantin → An old-style book face in the Garalde tradition Plantin descends from; graceful at text sizes with a genuinely bookish, sixteenth-century flavor.
- Sabon → Crimson explicitly cites Tschichold, Slimbach, and Hoefler as its design influences — a direct lineage to Sabon's design philosophy, with letterforms tuned for screen reading.
- Tiempos → An old-style book serif with elegant contrast and refined details for editorial typesetting. Slightly more bookish than Tiempos, but its measured contrast and reading-first construction make it a credible free stand-in for text settings.
Display + body that work together
The shape of a working week
Body type does the heavy lifting. Get it right and the reader never thinks about it; get it wrong and they feel it before they can name what is off.
Editorial · Modern Crimson Pro + Manrope
Quiet type that does the work
The display sets the register; the body follows through. When both halves of a pair pull in the same direction, the design disappears and the words come forward.
Modern · Editorial Switzer + Crimson Pro