This is a technical feature comparison of font editors.
Basic general information about font editors: creator, first release date, latest stable version, latest release date and license.
| Software | Creator | First release date | data-sort-type="number" | Latest stable version | Latest release date | License |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| BirdFont [1] | Johan Mattsson | or open source | ||||
| Crossfont | Aaron Elkins | |||||
| DTL FontMaster | Dutch Type Library | 3.0 | ||||
| DTL FontMaster Light | Dutch Type Library | 2.7 | ||||
| DTL OTMaster | 6.3[2] | |||||
| DTL OTMaster Light | 3.7 | |||||
| FontArk (Web service) | ||||||
| FontCreator | Erwin Denissen | 12.0 | ||||
| FontDraw | Alexander Kirichenko | 1.0 | ||||
| FontForge | George Williams | 20220308 | ||||
| FontLab | Yuri Yarmola | 8.0.1 | ||||
| Fontographer | Jim von Ehr | 5.2 | ||||
| Glyphr Studio [3] | Matt LaGrandeur, Mateusz Zawartka, Troy Coutu, & Eric Newport | 0.5.3 | October 2019 | |||
| Glyphs | Georg Seifert | 2011 | 2.6.2 | 2019 | , file format and parts of the code open source | |
| Ikarus | ||||||
| RoboFont | ||||||
| Type | 3.2 | |||||
| Type light | 3.2.038 | |||||
| TypeTool | 3.1 | |||||
| VOGG |
The table below lists the operating systems on which each font editor can run.
Below is an overview of general features typical for font editors.
| Software | Maximum number of glyphs supported | Colored glyphs | Windows Type 1 (.pfb) editor | Mac Type 1 (LWFN) editor | OpenType TT / TrueType (.ttf) editor | Mac TrueType (sfnt/dfont) editor | TrueType Collection (.ttc) editor | OpenType PS (.otf) editor | Macro / Script | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FontCreator | unlimited in source file[4] | [5] | import and export | import | import and export | OpenType PS (.otf) editor Macro / Script Transformations | ||||
| FontForge | [6] | import and export[7] | import and export[8] | import and export[9] | import and export[10] | import and export[11] | import and export[12] | [13] | ||
| FontLab | unlimited in source file | [14] | import & export | import & export | import | import | import & export | Python scripting | ||
| Glyphs | unlimited in source file | [15] | import | import | import & export | import | import | import & export | Python script and plug-ins, Objective-C plug-ins, free SDK available |
The OpenType cmap table can reference a maximum of 65536 glyphs.[16]
Font editors supporting TrueType hinting can do that either automatically or manually. The availability of these functions and the possibility to debug hinting is indicated in the following table.
| Software | Automatic TrueType hinting | Manual TrueType hinting | TrueType hinting debugger | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| FontCreator 12 | ttfAutohint | |||
| FontDraw 1.0 | ttfAutohint | |||
| FontLab | ttfAutohint & FontLab | GUI | code preview and rendering previews, including Windows ClearType on macOS | |
| Glyphs | ttfAutohint | GUI | live preview of 3 renderings |