Classic Sans Serif Fonts Give Your Print Projects a Crisp, Clean Appearance

Despite the "grotesque" name, this predecessor of Helvetica and Univers is a lovely favorite among many designers.

• Akzidenz-Grotesk Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Akzidenz-Grotesk Pro Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)

Drawn with geometric precision, it's a crisp headline font. The condensed weights are quite legible for text work as well.

• ITC Avant Garde Gothic Complete Family (Buy Direct)
• ITC Avant Garde Gothic Multilingual Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)

A popular choice for newspaper work, the various weights give this sans serif font great versatility and the condensed versions maintain high legibility in tight spaces.

• Franklin Gothic Complete Family Pack (Adobe) (Buy Direct)
• ITC Franklin Gothic Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• ITC Franklin Gothic Com Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)

This clean, legible sans serif font from Adrian Frutiger was originally designed for signage but works quite well for text and display. It was drawn with a certain subtle unevenness that produced a font that is warmer, friendlier than Helvetica and other early sans serifs. As with most classics, there are many versions of Frutiger.

• Frutiger Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Frutiger Pro Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Frutiger Next Pro Basic 1 Value Pack (Buy Direct)

Longer ascenders and descenders than many similiar text sans serif faces plus its geometric consistency help give Futura its elegant and practical appearance. It comes in many weights and makes a handsome font choice for text and display use.

• Futura Classic Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Futura Complete Family Pack Adobe (Buy Direct)
• Futura Com Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)

Eric Gill's popular and highly legible sans serif font comes in several weights for both text and display use.

• Gill Sans Family Value Pack (Buy Direct)
• Gill Sans Complete Family Pack Adobe (Buy Direct)
• Gill Sans Pro Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)

One of the most popular and confusing typefaces, this san serif font was originally designed by Max Miedinger in 1957. The introduction of Helvetica Neue brought some order to the chaos with more design consistency among the various weights that had developed throughout the 60s and 70s. Helvetica works well for many applications from body text to billboards.

• How many Helvetica versions are there?
• Helvetica Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Neue Helvetica Pro Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Helvetica Value Pack (Buy Direct)

Not Helvetica: Some of the fonts that look like Helvetica or are very similiar are Arial, Aristocrat, CG Tiumvirate, Claro, Corvus, Europa Grotesk, Geneva 2, Hamilton, Helio/II, Helv, Helvette, Holsatia, Megaron/II, Nimbus Sans URW, Spectra, Vega, Newton, Sans URW, Sonoran Sans Serif, Swiss, Swiss 721 BT, Switzerland, Swiss 911 BT (Helvetica Compressed), Impact and Placard Bold and Swiss 921 BT (Helvetica Inserat/Compressed), Arial Narrow (Helvetica Narrow). There are probably many others.

You'lll find a myriad of uses for this 1990s era Adobe Originals typeface. Robert Slimbach, Carol Twombly, and other Adobe staff had a hand in the design of this modern sans serif font.

• Myriad Pro Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Myriad Pro Volume (Buy Direct)

Hermann Zapf created Optima with tapered strokes that are almost like serif faces, but without the serifs. A classy choice for text and display use.

• Optima Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Optima Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Optima nova Basic 1 Value Pack (Buy Direct)

Similiar to the ever-popular Helvetica, there are 21 typefaces in Adrian Frutiger's Univers family. The full range of consistently developed weights makes it a versatile sans serif font choice that mixes and matches well for text and display.

• Linotype Univers Basic 1 Value Pack (Buy Direct)
• Univers Complete Family Pack (Buy Direct)
• Univers Next Pro Basic Family Pack (Buy Direct)