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Variable fonts Apps: Affinity Designer, Affinity Photo, Affinity Publisher Platforms: All You're now able to use variable fonts in all Affinity apps, providing a plethora of new typographic design possibilities. As well as providing predefined font styles, such as light, bold and condensed, variable fonts give you fine control of specific design aspects known as axes of variation, or just axes for short. To try out variable fonts in Affinity, apply one to some text and then: - On desktop, click the Font Variations button on the context toolbar (or on the Character Panel). - On iPad, tap the arrow to the right of Bold/Italic/Underline/Strikethrough on the Text Panel and then tap Variations. Variation settings on desktop. Variation settings on iPad. You'll see settings for each axis that the font designer has made individually adjustable. Axis' slider being dragged. Many variable fonts allow you to adjust their width and weight axes, and possibly italic, optical size and slant. These five axes are common enough that they're defined by the OpenType specification. All manner of other axes may also be adjustable, such as: - the height of ascenders and depth of descenders to better fit your chosen line spacing. - the stem terminals, to choose between straight and swelling. - the width of counters, which are enclosed and partially enclosed spaces within glyphs. For examples of other possible axes, check out the axis definitions that are available for variable fonts at Google Fonts. You may see fewer axes in Affinity than are mentioned by a font provider's marketing. For example, Google Fonts lists 13 axes for Roboto Flex and Affinity exposes five of them. This is because we respect font designers' ability to specify that an axis should be hidden. This is part of the OpenType specification and means that software isn't meant to provide an interface for such axes. Why would a designer do this? Well, a variable font might adjust an axis internally based on your choices for other axes that you can directly adjust. For example, observe how counter widths change when the weight axis is adjusted in the animation above. Variable fonts and PDFs PDF doesn't support variable fonts. So, when you export a PDF of an Affinity document that uses a variable font, we create a static instance of the font with fixed settings. We've taken steps to ensure static instances of fonts are well named. You should find this minimises the need to identify the original variable fonts if you later import or place the resulting PDFs.

First, there is an Italic variable font, there is an Italic axis, and there is a Slant axis. And they each work differently. So you cannot really compare it to Roboto Flex. Source Serif 4 Italic is a variable font (which is style-linked to the Roman variable font). In your video it looks like it is flipping back and forth between displaying the Italic variable font and the linked Roman variable font. Obviously it is not supposed to do that when simply moving the Weight axis. Did you install the Source Serif 4 variable TTF fonts or the variable OTF fonts? I do not know if Affinity is even going to support the OTF variable fonts (I doubt it). Windows 10 does not play well at all with the OTF variable fonts (do not even install to test). So test with the TTF variable fonts only. Are you on a Mac? The issue could be with how Adobe links the fonts in a non-standard way. Do you have any issues similar to this with other non-Adobe variable fonts which include both a separate Roman variable font and a separate Italic variable font? Meaning not a single variable font which includes an Italic axis. Two separate variable fonts.

Technically, variable fonts are "OpenType." The standard is called OpenType Variable. It's just like "color fonts" being part of the OpenType-SVG standard. The trick is whether the variable fonts are using TrueType style quadratic outlines or Postscript-based outlines. The ones with TTF outlines are packaged in a TrueType container.

No, they are OpenType variables - of the TrueType flavor. There are two flavors of OpenType: - OpenType-TT - with TrueType outlines - (quadratic curves) - (TT) - (.ttf) - OpenType-PS - with PostScript outlines - (cubic curves) - (CFF) - (.otf) Currently 99% of the OpenType variable fonts are OpenType-TT flavor. Adobe has now been making OpenType PS-flavor fonts too. For example Source Sans, Source Serif, Source Mono include both OTF and TTF. A few commercial vendors are now doing it too. The current CFF table (where the glyphs are kept) in OpenType-PS fonts does not support variability. So this required a new kind of table in the font, CFF2, to be able to support variability. Very few applications support CFF2, and OTF variable fonts (surprise Adobe does). And the new OFF spec these guys are working on includes being able to put PS curves in the existing glyf table used for OpenType-TT flavor fonts now - so it won't matter. So, yes the new icons are a bit misleading, but not really wrong.

I'm seeing some odd issues with certain variable axes not appearing, then later becoming visible and then disappearing again. For example, Helvetica Now Variable has three axes: weight, width and optical size. The optical size slider initially wasn't available, just the weight and width values. The drop-down menu showed the various display, text and micro pre-sets. The axis slider just wasn't there. I went down the menu, selecting some other variable fonts, such as Futura Now Variable. Its optical axis slider was visible. So I checked Helvetica Now again and the optical axis slider was restored. Temporarily. Messing with some other fonts caused it to disappear again. It just comes and goes. I understand the "hidden" axes for fonts like Roboto Serif, but even in those cases some axes that should be visible, such as Grade, are hidden. That's the case for Roboto Serif and Amstelvar.

I'm unsure if this has already been picked up and logged from @R C-R's post in the main Variable Font Support thread here. Selecting a Font Book folder containing Variable Fonts from the All Fonts dropdown in the Character Panel or the All Fonts dropdown in the Font section of the Text Style Editor instantly crashes all three apps... Note 1: The document itself doesn't need to include any variable fonts or indeed any fonts at all... Note 2: Selecting any other Font Book folder without variable fonts doesn't cause the crash... Note 3: This doesn’t happen in the v1 version of the apps… This affects v2.4.2 and the v2.5.0 Beta... Crash Reports Affinity Publisher 2 Beta-2024-04-30-142411.ips Affinity Publisher 2 Affinity Store-2024-04-30-142032.ips

Now here's something I didn't spot before. All this talk of Variable Fonts - and how do you spot them in your font list? I finally stumbled on it. Probably been there for years, but I know I'm not the only one because I've seen the question asked before. On the Mac at least, and on Windows, but NOT on the iPad in Affinity Photo, it looks like this. Variable fonts are marked with a V inside a C, and ttf with a T, and non variable Otf with a bit O. Most allow you to Favourite them with the heart - some don't. I've no idea why that is. Cool.

Affinity Designer/Publisher/Photo Beta 2.5.0 (2415) When opening a document which uses fonts Affinity Designer tries to load the fonts to display them. The fonts may be missing (deactivated), in that case macOS implicitly sends a font request to external applications, such that font managers can automatically provide the missing fonts if they're available. This works correctly for static fonts and variable fonts that use one of the named presets. For example when using the variable RobotoFlex-Regular in a document (without changing any variable parameters) Affinity will correctly request RobotoFlex-Regular on reopen. If any of the parameters of a variable font is changed, such that it doesn't match with any of the named instances, then the Affinity apps do not send a font request. This means that font managers do not have the opportunity to auto activate the missing variable fonts. For example: Activate variable Roboto Flex in a font manager Open a blank document in Affinity Designer 2.5.0 Add a text block and use Roboto Flex Adjust the weight axis to 415 (this doesn't match with any named instance) Save and close the document Deactivate the variable Roboto Flex in a font manager Reopen the document => Font is missing (expected), but also no font request is sent so the font cannot be auto activated by macOS It's a bit hard to verify/reproduce this, as the font request happens behind the scenes in macOS and you need a font manager to capture this request. Font requests are typically sent automatically when a font is loaded using an NSFontDescriptor. For example loading a font using a descriptor with a font name NSFontDescriptor(fontAttributes: [ .name: "RobotoFlex-Regular" ]) will look for any available font with that name. It seems like Affinity loads a font differently when axes are adjusted. (Note that this only applies to missing, deactivated fonts. Activated fonts are correctly loaded on document reopen.) If any additional information is needed I'm happy to help.

There has been a similar issue with some variable fonts from GF in InDesign. (you see this in the various issue trackers) That one is related to some non-standard stuff Adobe wants in the fonts. Specifically in the name table. I hope this is not the same thing - meaning Affinity is following the same path. Because that is a direct collision course with GF. Anyway, I'm off to rummage around... EDIT: correction "name" table And: Or this just could be normal Beta stuff.

I'm no longer sure where I should be reporting/following bug reports related to variable fonts, but I just checked in the new 2430 beta & the crash still occurs if a Font Book collection includes variable fonts & that is selected in the Character panel.

Here's a list of the bugs which have been fixed in the beta build 2.5.0 (2430) (fixes since beta 2.5.0.2415) Please reply in this forum to comment on any fixes which are in this list (in particular to let us know if you notice that something we say is fixed isn't!) To report any new bugs please do that against the relevant new feature post, or if unrelated to new functionality in the Other bugs & issues forum. Changes/Bugs affecting all platforms Pencil Tool auto-close - add cursor change [AF-2788] Line Width Tool renamed to Stroke Width Tool [AF-2727] First point on a vector stroke when using the pencil or vector brush is in the wrong direction [AF-339] Bugs affecting Desktop (Windows and macOS) Crash re-saving a document with a Style [AF-2718] App crashes on launch if cs.json is empty [AF-2879] Variable Font - All axes visible when they shouldn't be [AF-2910] Presets: QR Code is missing from the Filter [AF-2816] Text Style Editor: Turning off Decorations will cause app to crash if Paragraph Panel is visible and style is applied to text Text Style Editor: Label differences between Language settings in Character Panel [AF-2857] Text Style Editor: Optical Alignment section is missing 'No Change' text in the list of adjustments and no way to reset [AF-2881] Text Style Editor: No real-time update to text on the page when the Leading value is updated [AF-2859] Text Style Editor: Removing all decorations doesn't enable the + button [AF-2872] Text Style Editor: Slight difference between Position & Transform ordering compared to Paragraph Panel [AF-2856] Text Style Editor: The Ligatures and Alternates text labels contain two colons [AF-2858] Text Style Editor: Optical Alignment Add button adds both an empty entry along with default list. [AF-2882] Line Width Tool is not made available on 2.4 > 2.5 upgrades Line Width Tool handles don't respond to Tool Handle Size changes Line Width Tool addition means there are now two Pencil Tool groups on the Customise Tools UI Set Line Width At Point dialog should say Width instead of Weight Bugs affecting Windows Installing AF Fonts will cause the app to crash, and then crash on launch with no way to Ctrl runup AF-2877 IDMl import > Some pinned images have incorrect scaling Variable Fonts: Adjusting axes using mouse wheel on Windows doesn't update text [AF-2846] Chinese font names are not appearing in Chinese on Windows [AF-2913] Font outlines aren't closed off correctly Fonts installed via Creative Cloud cannot be found [AF-2909] Bullets & Numbering Name entry box background is grey [AF-2860] QR Code - shape does not update on payload change [AF-2767] Text Style Editor: Style Name entry box background is grey [AF-2861] Text Style Editor: Dialog no longer remembers the last category that was selected Typography Panel - Floating - Changes size when fonts switch Mouse wheel doesn't change stroke width in Decorations [AF-2888] Typography Panel -Tab order - radio button highlight incorrect Gradient outline still present on Panel tabs [AF-2892] New Document Category dropdown won't allow bottom entries to be selected Bugs affecting macOS Variable fonts - Axes values not updating [AF-2845] Variable fonts - Axes panel has transparency enabled [AF-2878] Apps can crash whilst in the background [AF-2698] Text Style Editor: Dialog no longer remembers the last category that was selected Text Style Editor: Style Settings background colour doesn't respond to UI Style on macOS AF-2862] Text Style Editor: Style Name entry box background is grey Text Style Editor: Font Family dropdown isn't honouring the UI Style [AF-2855] Bullets & Numbering Name entry box background is grey Section Manager's Name field has incorrect background colour. [AF-2800 Typography Shortcuts is missing from Settings > Shortcuts on MacOS [AF-2787] Importing Images using EPSON Standard RGB - Gamma 1.8 Profile causes an app crash [AF-2655] Bugs affecting iPad Character Panel - Variations doesn't update if showing when font is changed [AF-2836] Line Width tool missing name in tool flyout [AF-2700]

Feature Request... Would it be possible to add a similar feature to filter by True Type, Open Type and Variable Fonts to the Text Style Editor via the adjacent dropdown, i.e., add 'Variable' to the list which already includes 'Recent' and 'Favourite' and ideally add the same filter option now available in the Context toolbar to the font dropdown in the Character panel...

Keen to hear what you discover… I think the main issue is that using the same Italic variable fonts only demonstrates the problem on Mac when dragging the weight slider, all works correctly using on Windows…

Taking a break from variable fonts and typography panels (latest Betas). Used the original illustration from the public domain collection of the British Library, did some B/W adjusting to the original, then some watercolouring, then a pastel plugin, back to Photo. Saved as a PNG, then placed it in a new file, added a duplicate layer then a new fill layer above the background layer, an inverted mask and some watercolour brushes, then some adjustments (levels, brightness/contrast, vibrance) and then a merge visible. All suggestions thanks to @Frankentoon Studio 's mystery box series. Added a new pixel layer and some more watercolour painting, then a lighting filter. Any resemblance to the famous Castle in Ghana is purely incidental. 🫣

Webflow does just that by putting a bullet point style dot against the Variable Font Name and automatically grouping variable fonts so they all appear together in the font list, so you effectively have all static fonts in one section of the list and all variables in their own section which is nice because you have instant access to all your variable fonts without the need to scroll through what can be a long list of fonts trying to locate the variable font and you can instantly identify which fonts are the variable ones… Something similar could be a nice addition to the Affinity apps perhaps 🤔

This is indeed new to this Beta, note also the additions at the top of the font dropdown menu which now allow you to filter by True Type, Open Type and Variable Fonts which is an excellent addition...

Hi All, We have just made a new build available of a 2.5.0 beta live - version 2.5.0.2430 - This was created to address improve the new features announced in this post The fix list for this build is here It includes some significant changes to improve the Variable Fonts feature Ash

Selecting Character > Font Collection > English or the equivalent control in Edit Text Style immediately crashes Affinity. The other collections work fine. I thought this was a new issue in the beta but was surprised to find that it also happened in 2.4.2. The English collection is an automatic language collection. I'm sure I've tested it before and it didn't crash but I recently installed several variable fonts to test them in 2.5 so perhaps that's related. My system is set to English Canada if that makes a difference. Affinity Publisher 2 Affinity Store-2024-05-02-083818.ips Here's my font collection list, it's just the basics, I don't currently have any collections of my own.

I'm seeing a difference between the kerning for variable fonts. I've captured these two images to show the differences, Google fonts: Montserrat and Josefin Sans. Both fonts are identical size and kerning settings, but the BOLD versions of these fonts show the X and A closer together (alongside other issues, notice the closeness of the 'T's), it appears to be a problem with vairable fonts files only. I was using the Google fonts repo inside my Fonts on the newer machine, however after looking into it further my older machine uses separate .ttf files versus the Google fonts repo (https://github.com/google/fonts) which uses [wght].ttf files. I've managed to transfer the original .ttf files from my old machine that I need, but wanted to flag to the Affinity team since the Google Fonts github repo and website provide these problematic [wght].ttf and similarly other websites with variables fonts files as default. I tested the issue with another variable font: (https://github.com/github/hubot-sans) > For anyone facing a similar issue, you can download the family of fonts from Google Fonts and they provide a 'static' folder where you can use the individual .ttf files.

Will there be any value of including Variable Fonts accessibility in Affinity products? I see this as being a great time-saver when working on projects requiring a single font in various weights. ** Not heard of Variable Fonts? reads here: https://developers.google.com/web/fundamentals/design-and-ux/typography/variable-fonts/ https://v-fonts.com/ https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/CSS_Fonts/Variable_Fonts_Guide https://medium.com/variable-fonts/https-medium-com-tiro-introducing-opentype-variable-fonts-12ba6cd2369

The problem is quite simple. I am not able to use variable fonts installed on my system. I have attached screenshots showing that my computer properly recognizes the font however, none of the programs, Photo 2, Designer 2, Publisher 2, correctly recognise my font. And yes, this is the case with other variable fonts as well, not just one. Fonts were downloaded from Google Fonts. Running Windows 11 22H2. Downloaded all programs from Microsoft Store. If you need any other info, I'll be happy to provide. P.S: Sucks to not be able to create something on the first day itself. But I guess launching a software has its share of challenges.

Hi @MikeTO, This is already logged under AF-2922 and relates specifically to variable fonts affecting both v2.4.2 and 2.5.0 but not 1.10.8...

Version 1.8 of OpenType was released in 2016, it included Variable fonts. The feature is mature and widely used nowadays. It would be great to have support for variable fonts.

It's been more than 2 years people are requesting support for variable fonts. I'd like to bring this topic up since it seems not getting any attention. Of course this affects all Affinity products and not only Affinity Publisher. And if basic font support does not make it to the essential feature requirements please make sure to handle this failure/bug with a bit of dignity (even Photoshop 6 disables the styles for variable fonts and does not display random nonsense) Cheers, Timo

Just finished watching a WWDC session about the updates on Apple’s system font… they’re switching to a variable font file, and Im just wondering if I am going to be able to work with those new fonts once they’re released, on my iPad (and Mac). Are you guys planning to add variable font support?