The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
Free font
Forum
A free alternative to Amagro.
About Forum
Forum is a serif drawn by Denis Masharov in 2011 around Roman epigraphic letterforms, the capital shapes cut into stone rather than written with a pen. Its defining feature is flared terminals: strokes that widen as they approach the baseline and cap line instead of resolving into conventional serifs, producing stress-modulated forms that sit somewhere between serif and sans.
That is the same letterform DNA as Optima, which is why Forum is the standard free substitute for it. Both build their elegance out of modulated stems and flared endings rather than applied serifs. Forum is the more classically inscriptional of the two — closer to its Roman roots — so it suits luxury branding, cultural and museum work, and titling where a note of antiquity is welcome. Where Optima's neutrality is the point, the difference will show.
- Designer
- Denis Masharov
- Released
- 2011
- Available at
- Google Fonts →
Forum is also a free alternative to…
- Amagro → A single-weight serif built on the proportions of Roman capitals, with triangular wedge serifs that echo Amagro's sharp terminals. Forum is softer and rounder in detail and includes a lowercase, so it reads more like a text face, but its capitals carry a similar monumental quality.
- Optima → Strongly featured flared terminals that directly echo Optima's defining stress-modulated, flared-stroke construction. More classically inscriptional than Optima — closer to Forum's Roman epigraphic roots — but the same letterform DNA.
- Cresci Exemplar Pro → Denis Masharov's Forum is a Roman-inspired display face with wide, stately capitals and a modest lowercase. Its proportions sit close to Cresci's monumental letters, and it keeps the same restrained contrast, but the lowercase and more mechanical finish shift it toward a general display serif rather than pure inscriptional titling.
- PF Monumenta Pro → Denis Masharov's Forum takes its forms from Roman monumental capitals and ancient architecture, with a slightly condensed and sturdier build than Monumenta. It includes Cyrillic, which matters if you are replacing Monumenta Pro's extended language coverage on a multilingual heritage or museum site.
- FS Renaissance → Roman capitals with a classical skeleton and a slightly softened, hand-drawn finish, closer in spirit to Black's lettering than a strict epigraphic revival. Lighter and less dramatic than FS Renaissance, but it fills the same elegant-headline role.
Display + body that work together
The shape of a working week
Two thousand years of letterforms boil down to a handful of decisions — width, weight, proportion. Pick a pair you trust, and let the rest take care of itself.
Headlines that read at a glance
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.