6 ms·

I've been finding Proxima Nova[1] everywhere this year. I'm not complaining though—I think it's a beautiful, highly readable typeface. [1] https://typekit.com/

I've been finding Proxima Nova[1] everywhere this year. I'm not complaining though—I think it's a beautiful, highly readable typeface. [1] https://typekit.com/fonts/proxima-nova https://typekit.com/fonts/proxima-nova

sudonim 14y ago
Yup! We use Proxima-Nova. It's probably the next Helvetica Neue (i.e. hipster designers will be rolling their eyes at you soon). One of the things that's great about it is there are so many variations: Regular, Light, Regular Italic, Light Italic, Semibold, Bold, Extrabold, Black, Semibold Italic, Bold Italic. Most other sans-serif typefaces we evaluated didn't have enough variation that it could reliably service any use-case. We use proxima-nova on http://customer.io http://customer.io as well as in all our presentations (e.g. https://speakerdeck.com/sudonim/write-emails-people-will-read https://speakerdeck.com/sudonim/write-emails-people-will-rea... ) . Love that typeface.
- peterjmag 14y ago
  Agreed on the huge range of weights and styles. I experimented with almost all of them for http://peterjmags.com/ http://peterjmags.com/ before settling on the current two for headings. Each variation that I tried had such a different impact on the overall design and "character" of my site. To me, that's the mark of a well-designed family of type. And great work on the customer.io site! I was actually admiring it just yesterday after following your link in another thread: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4912268 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4912268
- swah 14y ago
  Off-topic: do you know where a beautiful document like http://www.marksimonson.com/fontspecimens/ProximaNovaOverview.pdf http://www.marksimonson.com/fontspecimens/ProximaNovaOvervie... is made?
MrAlmostWrong 14y ago
Ha, I was just thinking this the other week and now seeing it on Github makes me want to find another font to use everywhere. Probably won't happen.
huhtenberg 14y ago
Not just this year. Few years ago Mark Simonson, its creator, was the first type designer with balls big enough to let go of a tight control over PN's distribution and embrace its online use. Back then uttering "Cufon" or "embedding" on Typophile would give you strange looks at best and a flame war centered around lost profits and piracy at worst. He was also one of few designers to extensively hint fonts for on screen use _in smaller sizes on Windows_. PN was basically the first non-OS font that looked great on Windows in 11px. The last contributing factor was that in all caps PN looked very close to Gotham, but it was also few times cheaper. If you ever looked at Gotham, you know how well it works as a heading font. And PN was the only online-friendly alternative. In other words, the position that Proxima Nova enjoys now is directly related to the liberal license that Mark released it under and the hard and focused work he put into polishing it for the online use. Props to him.
- peterjmag 14y ago
  That's really interesting. I know that type designers and foundries are historically pretty conservative in terms of licensing/sharing/etc, so it's great to see someone reaping the benefits for bucking that trend.
nigelsampson 14y ago
I'm using it on my website as it seems one of the closer ones to Segoe for "metro" style websites.
namzo 14y ago
.. And Open Sans too
mikesten 14y ago
I have a little project where I'm collecting uses of web fonts and half the sites I come across are using Proxima Nova: http://www.typ.io/fonts/proxima_nova.. http://www.typ.io/fonts/proxima_nova... But it _is_ nice and incredibly versatile. I love its caps and its bold. Just added customer.io too. ;)
- sudonim 14y ago
  Cool! Thanks Mike.

sudonim 14y ago

Yup! We use Proxima-Nova. It's probably the next Helvetica Neue (i.e. hipster designers will be rolling their eyes at you soon). One of the things that's great about it is there are so many variations: Regular, Light, Regular Italic, Light Italic, Semibold, Bold, Extrabold, Black, Semibold Italic, Bold Italic. Most other sans-serif typefaces we evaluated didn't have enough variation that it could reliably service any use-case. We use proxima-nova on http://customer.io http://customer.io as well as in all our presentations (e.g. https://speakerdeck.com/sudonim/write-emails-people-will-read https://speakerdeck.com/sudonim/write-emails-people-will-rea... ) . Love that typeface.

peterjmag 14y ago
Agreed on the huge range of weights and styles. I experimented with almost all of them for http://peterjmags.com/ http://peterjmags.com/ before settling on the current two for headings. Each variation that I tried had such a different impact on the overall design and "character" of my site. To me, that's the mark of a well-designed family of type. And great work on the customer.io site! I was actually admiring it just yesterday after following your link in another thread: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4912268 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4912268
swah 14y ago
Off-topic: do you know where a beautiful document like http://www.marksimonson.com/fontspecimens/ProximaNovaOverview.pdf http://www.marksimonson.com/fontspecimens/ProximaNovaOvervie... is made?

MrAlmostWrong 14y ago

Ha, I was just thinking this the other week and now seeing it on Github makes me want to find another font to use everywhere. Probably won't happen.

huhtenberg 14y ago

Not just this year. Few years ago Mark Simonson, its creator, was the first type designer with balls big enough to let go of a tight control over PN's distribution and embrace its online use. Back then uttering "Cufon" or "embedding" on Typophile would give you strange looks at best and a flame war centered around lost profits and piracy at worst. He was also one of few designers to extensively hint fonts for on screen use _in smaller sizes on Windows_. PN was basically the first non-OS font that looked great on Windows in 11px. The last contributing factor was that in all caps PN looked very close to Gotham, but it was also few times cheaper. If you ever looked at Gotham, you know how well it works as a heading font. And PN was the only online-friendly alternative. In other words, the position that Proxima Nova enjoys now is directly related to the liberal license that Mark released it under and the hard and focused work he put into polishing it for the online use. Props to him.

peterjmag 14y ago
That's really interesting. I know that type designers and foundries are historically pretty conservative in terms of licensing/sharing/etc, so it's great to see someone reaping the benefits for bucking that trend.

nigelsampson 14y ago

I'm using it on my website as it seems one of the closer ones to Segoe for "metro" style websites.

namzo 14y ago

.. And Open Sans too

mikesten 14y ago

I have a little project where I'm collecting uses of web fonts and half the sites I come across are using Proxima Nova: http://www.typ.io/fonts/proxima_nova.. http://www.typ.io/fonts/proxima_nova... But it _is_ nice and incredibly versatile. I love its caps and its bold. Just added customer.io too. ;)

sudonim 14y ago
Cool! Thanks Mike.