Ten Things To Know About OpenType Fonts

1.  OpenType fonts were developed by Microsoft & Adobe upon the previous TrueType and PosrScript font format. 2.  The OpenType format was developed out of the need of a more expressive font format to handle fine typography and the complex behavior of many of the world’s writing systems 3.  OpenType fonts became the industry standard around 2005. 4.  An OpenType font can accommodate more than 65,000 glyphs where the previous TrueType and PostScript fonts could only contain up to 256 characters. 5.  OpenType fonts are cross-platform font files, which mean they can be used without modification on Mac OS & Windows operating systems. 6.  Unicode standards give Open Type fonts much better language support opportunities than Post Script or True Type fonts. Unicode’s consistent encoding can support multiple language characters instead of one font for each language group (Western Roman, CE, Baltic, etc.). 7.  OpenType fonts are digitally signed which means your applications and operating system can verify the source and integrity of the font, making them more secure. 8.  Changes to kerning, line spacing and naming don’t allow for compatibility between the new OpenType Fonts and older TrueType and PostScript fonts. 9.  Most new applications support the OpenType format since it is the industry standard. 10.  OpenType font file sizes can be considerably smaller than their older counterparts. Macware has a collection of over 6,200 OpenType fonts designed by our own SummitType font foundry.  You can view the collection here: Macware’s Premium Font Collections.  You can also download 40 Free Fonts.