The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
Free font
Merriweather
A free alternative to Bookerly.
About Merriweather
Merriweather is Eben Sorkin's 2010 text serif, designed explicitly for pleasant on-screen reading rather than adapted to it. The construction follows from that brief: a very large x-height, slightly condensed proportions that save horizontal space, and strong, firm serifs that stay legible at small sizes. It sets darker and more emphatic than most screen serifs, giving text blocks a solid presence.
It's the standard free answer to Georgia, matching that font's role while running heavier and more emphatic on the page. It also displaces Times New Roman for web work — for long-form articles Merriweather outperforms Times by a noticeable margin, since Times was never drawn for the screen. Reach for it on text-heavy sites, documentation, and editorial layouts. Free on Google Fonts.
- Designer
- Eben Sorkin
- Released
- 2010
- Available at
- Google Fonts →
Merriweather is also a free alternative to…
- Bookerly → Drawn for on-screen reading with a large x-height, sturdy strokes and open counters, which gives it the same dense, even texture Bookerly produces on e-ink. It is a touch wider and heavier than Bookerly, so it fills a measure faster at the same point size.
- Georgia → Designed explicitly for pleasant on-screen reading — very large x-height, slightly condensed forms, and strong serifs that hold up at small sizes. Darker and more emphatic than Georgia; a workhorse for text-heavy sites.
- Times New Roman → Drawn explicitly for on-screen reading at body-text sizes. Slightly condensed proportions and a tall x-height — for long-form web articles, Merriweather outperforms Times by a noticeable margin.
- Cambria → Designed for on-screen reading with a tall x-height, sturdy low-contrast strokes and slightly condensed letterforms, the same brief Cambria answered for Microsoft. It is a little rounder and warmer, and its variable axes give you weights Cambria never had.
- Bitstream Vera Serif → Designed for screen reading with a tall x-height, slightly condensed letterforms and strong serifs, which puts it in the same workhorse territory as Vera Serif. It leans more traditional and has more stroke contrast, so body text looks a little more bookish and less slab-like.
- DejaVu Serif → Built for screen reading with a tall x-height, sturdy serifs and open letterforms, it matches DejaVu Serif's robust texture at small sizes. Merriweather has more modulation and a slightly condensed, bookish character, so the page looks warmer and more editorial than DejaVu's utilitarian tone.
- Georgia Pro → Designed by Sorkin for screen reading like Georgia itself, with a tall x-height, sturdy serifs and slightly condensed forms. Its wide variable weight range covers Georgia Pro's Light-to-Black spread. It is a touch more angular and less Scotch Roman in flavor, with a lower contrast that reads darker at text sizes.
Display + body that work together
The shape of a working week
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.
Editorial · Modern Merriweather + Inter
Quiet type that does the work
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.
Modern · Editorial Geist + Merriweather