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adobe-fonts/source-han-serif

★ 9,396ShellAudience · designerComplexity · 1/5Setup · easy

TLDR

Free, open-source serif font family by Adobe covering Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Latin characters, available in multiple formats including variable fonts and ready-to-download releases.

Mindmap

mindmap
  root((source-han-serif))
    What it does
      Pan-CJK serif font
      Covers Chinese Japanese Korean
      Includes Latin scripts
    Formats
      OTF per weight
      OTC bundled
      Super OTC all-in-one
      Variable WOFF2
    Audience
      Type designers
      Multilingual app devs
      Web publishers
    Tech
      Built with AFDKO
      Shell build scripts
    Use cases
      Web typography
      Desktop publishing
      App localization
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Code map

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Things people build with this

USE CASE 1

Install a high-quality CJK serif font in your app or document without paying a licensing fee.

USE CASE 2

Bundle an OTC file to support Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Japanese, and Korean with one font file.

USE CASE 3

Use variable font versions in WOFF2 format for responsive web typography across East Asian scripts.

USE CASE 4

Rebuild the fonts from source using Adobe's AFDKO tools to customize or verify the output.

Tech stack

ShellAFDKO

Getting it running

Difficulty · easy Time to first run · 5min
Free and open-source, use in personal and commercial projects without a licensing fee.

In plain English

Source Han Serif is a free, open-source font family created by Adobe that covers Chinese, Japanese, and Korean characters, along with Latin and other scripts. The name refers to a serif style, which means the letterforms have small finishing strokes at the ends of the main lines, similar to how traditional print typography looks in books and formal documents. The project supports Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese (including a Hong Kong variant), Japanese, and Korean, making it one of the more comprehensive Pan-CJK font releases available. Adobe built the fonts using its own font development tools, called AFDKO, and the repository includes all the source files needed to rebuild the fonts from scratch. The downloadable versions come in several formats and configurations: standard OTF files for individual weights, OTC files that bundle multiple languages into one file for efficiency, a Super OTC that combines everything, and newer variable font versions in OTF, TTF, and WOFF2 formats. A download guide is included in five languages to help users pick the right configuration for their situation. The repository is primarily useful to type designers, developers working on multilingual applications, or anyone who needs a high-quality serif typeface that covers East Asian scripts without a licensing fee. Someone who just wants to install the font does not need to build from source and can download a ready-to-use release directly from the releases page. Official documentation, including the design rationale and technical font readme, is available as PDF files linked from the repository.

Copy-paste prompts

Prompt 1
Set up Source Han Serif for a multilingual web project that needs to display Chinese, Japanese, and Korean text, which font format should I use and how do I load it in CSS?
Prompt 2
I need to add a CJK-compatible serif font to my Electron desktop app. Walk me through choosing and bundling the right Source Han Serif variant for Simplified Chinese users.
Prompt 3
Generate a CSS @font-face rule to serve Source Han Serif as a variable font for a Japanese blog, falling back to system fonts.
Prompt 4
Show me a shell script that downloads the latest Source Han Serif Super OTC release from GitHub and installs it on macOS.
Prompt 5
Explain the difference between the OTF, OTC, Super OTC, and variable font packages in Source Han Serif so I can pick the right one for my use case.
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