How to QUICKLY Install Fonts in Linux [GUI and CLI]

Linux is Freedom, we all know that. As the end user, we have the freedom to make any changes to the system, including changing the fonts. Every Linux distribution comes with some fonts installed. So, How to install fonts in Linux other than what is already there?

Install Fonts in Linux with Desktop Environment

On Linux, some desktop environments allow installing fonts with a graphical interface. Let's examine the font installation steps for the Gnome(Fedora OS) and KDE(Debian, Pardus OS) desktop environments.

Gnome Desktop

If you have Gnome desktop installed on your system, it comes with the gnome-font-viewer application installed. You can call it by typing "fonts" from the menu.

All fonts are listed on this screen. Click on the font you want to install. If the button on the top right of the screen is "Installed", the font you have chosen is already installed. If “Install” is active, you can click and install it on your system.

By clicking on Info, you can see where the package is installed and all the information about the package. You can install fonts that are not in Gnome Fonts and exist in the package repository.

For example, the saab-fonts package is not installed on the system, so it did not appear in Gnome fonts.

Then let's install the package;

foc@fedora:~$ sudo dnf install saab-fonts

Now let's look at Gnome Fonts again.

You can see it loaded into the system.

To remove the font you have installed from the system, let's first find the font name;

foc@fedora:~$ sudo dnf list installed | grep saab
saab-fonts.noarch                                 0.91-24.fc35                         @fedora  

Let's remove it from the system;

foc@fedora:~$ sudo dnf remove saab-fonts

Then when you search for the font on Gnome Fonts, you can see that it is deleted.

KDE Desktop

Open the Font Management application from the menu. System fonts and personal fonts are listed on this screen.

Then click the Add button. On the screen that comes up, select the fonts you have downloaded from the internet and click the Open button.

What types of fonts should be installed?

For example, we choose the Personal/System font. Then the fonts are loaded into the system.

To remove the font from the system, simply press the Delete button on the screen.

Install Fonts in Linux Terminal

In Linux, system fonts and personal fonts are in different directories. Let's talk about the font installation steps in two options.

Personal Fonts

Fonts are located in the following directory under each user's home directory;

foc@fedora:~$ ls -l ~/.local/share/fonts 
total 120
-rw-r--r--. 1 foc foc 58940 Jul 24  2021 1Waree-Oblique.otf
-rw-r--r--. 1 foc foc 58940 Jul 24  2021 Waree-Oblique.otf

Create [font_family] name for newly downloaded fonts;

foc@fedora:~$ mkdir -p ~/.local/share/fonts/linux-biolinum

Copy the fonts you downloaded to this directory;

foc@fedora:~$ cp ~/Downloads/linux-biolinum/*.ttf ~/.local/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/

Update font cache with fc-cache;

foc@fedora:~$ fc-cache -f -v

System Fonts

System fonts are located in the following directory;

foc@fedora:~$ ls -l /usr/share/fonts/
total 0
drwxr-xr-x. 1 root root  232 Apr 21 00:03 aajohan-comfortaa-fonts
drwxr-xr-x. 1 root root  698 Oct 26  2021 adobe-source-code-pro
drwxr-xr-x. 1 root root  550 Jul 21 16:28 adobe-source-sans-pro-fonts

Create the family directory in the main fonts directory as in Personal fonts. But this time run the command with sudo or apply as root user;

foc@fedora:~$ sudo mkdir -p /usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum

Then copy the files to this directory;

foc@fedora:~$ sudo cp ~/Downloads/linux-biolinum/*.ttf /usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/

Clear and regenerate font cache with the following command:

foc@fedora:~$ fc-cache -f -v

After these steps, you can see these fonts on your system with the following commands;

foc@fedora:~$ fc-list | grep  linux-biolinum
/usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/LinBiolinum_RIah.ttf: Linux Biolinum:style=Italic
/usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/LinBiolinum_RBah.ttf: Linux Biolinum:style=Bold
/usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/LinBiolinum_Rah.ttf: Linux Biolinum:style=Regular
/usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/LinBiolinum_Kah.ttf: Linux Biolinum Keyboard:style=Regular

Uninstall Fonts

To remove the font from your system, the file path where the font is located must first be known;

foc@fedora:~$ fc-list | grep biolinum
/usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/LinBiolinum_RIah.ttf: Linux Biolinum:style=Italic
/usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/LinBiolinum_RBah.ttf: Linux Biolinum:style=Bold

Then type the font you want to delete after the rm command. To delete a single font belonging to the font family;

foc@fedora:~$ sudo rm /usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/LinBiolinum_Rıah.ttf

To completely delete the font family;

foc@fedora:~$ sudo rm -rf /usr/share/fonts/linux-biolinum/

Now let's list the fonts again;

foc@fedora:~$ fc-list | grep biolinum

After this command, you can see that the fonts are not installed in the system.

Summary

In Linux, the fonts brought by the system and found in the repositories are always stable ones. 3rd party installed fonts can sometimes be a problem. Our recommendation is to use the fonts that are available in the system or that are available for download in the repository for you.

References

Gnome DE - Adding new fonts in Fedora
KDE – Font Management

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