This library provides a wrapper for several other Python libraries which together compile fonts from various sources (.glyphs, .ufo) into binaries (.otf, .ttf).

Fontmake requires Python 3.6 or later.

Releases are available on PyPI and can be installed with pip.

pip install fontmake

Use the -U, --upgrade option to update fontmake and its dependencies to the newest available release:

pip install -U fontmake

Alternatively, you can download the git repository and install from source:

git clone https://github.com/googlefonts/fontmake
cd fontmake
pip install .

Developers who want to quickly test changes to the source code without re-installing, can use the "--editable" option when installing from a local source checkout:

pip install -e .

It is recommended to install fontmake inside a "virtual environment" to prevent conflicts between its dependencies and other modules installed globally.

Alternatively, we also provide a self-contained, standalone version of fontmake that only requires a Python 3.6 or 3.7 installation to run. These are available to download from the fontmake Github releases page. You simply unzip them and run the included fontmake command from your console.

After installation, you can use the fontmake console script. For example:

fontmake -g MyFont.glyphs  # outputs binary font files for masters only

Use fontmake -h to see options for specifying different types of input and output.

You can also use fontmake as a module to run intermediate steps in the build process, via methods of the fontmake.font_project.FontProject class.