What Font File Formats Can FontDrop! Open?

Updated

FontDrop! is built to open standard font files and show you what's inside them. The formats it is designed to view are TTF (TrueType), OTF (OpenType), WOFF, and WOFF2. If you have a font file in one of these formats, you can load it into the tool and inspect its contents rather than just seeing it rendered as text.

Formats the site is designed to view

Format Full name Typical use
TTF TrueType Font Desktop and system fonts
OTF OpenType Font Desktop fonts, often with advanced typographic features
WOFF Web Open Font Format Web fonts
WOFF2 Web Open Font Format 2 Web fonts, compressed for faster loading

The site describes itself simply as a "simple and easy way to view the content of font files," so its purpose is inspection, not editing or conversion. You load a font and read what it contains.

How to tell whether a file is a supported font file

The most reliable signal is the file extension. Font files end in .ttf, .otf, .woff, or .woff2. If a file has one of those extensions, it is in the category the tool is meant to open.

A second check is where the file came from. Fonts downloaded from a type foundry, pulled from a design project, or exported from a web project's asset folder are usually in one of these formats. Files with other extensions, such as .fon, .fnt, or .dfont, are different font containers and are not part of the standard set above.

What to do if a file is not recognized

If the tool does not accept a file, work through these steps:

  1. Confirm the extension. Rename nothing yet — just check that the file ends in one of the four supported extensions. A file labeled as a font but ending in something else is likely a different container format.
  2. Check for a compressed archive. Fonts are sometimes distributed inside .zip files. Extract the archive first, then load the font file itself.
  3. Look for a web-font pair. If you have a .woff or .woff2 file, it may have been generated from a source .ttf or .otf. Either version can be inspected, but the source file usually carries more of the original data.
  4. Verify the file is not corrupted. A download that was interrupted can produce a file with the right extension but unreadable content. Re-download from the original source and try again.

If the file has a supported extension and still fails, the file itself is the likely problem rather than the format.

What you get once a file opens

Opening a font in FontDrop! lets you view its content — the kind of information that helps you decide whether a font is right for a project or understand how it was built. This is useful when you receive a font from a collaborator, download one from an unfamiliar source, or need to check a web font before adding it to a site. The tool is a viewer, so treat it as a way to look inside a file, not as a way to change it.