This site will have limited functionality while we undergo maintenance to improve your experience. If an article doesn't solve your issue and you want to ask a question, we have our support community waiting to help you at @FirefoxSupport on Twitter and/r/firefox on Reddit.

Avatar for Username

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

This thread was archived. Please ask a new question if you need help.

Fonts displaying wrong on random websites

  • 6 majibu
  • 1 ana tatizo hili
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by cor-el

Owen
Owen
more options

My FireFox automatically updated overnight and now certain websites display an Impact-like font that is hard to read. I know it's possible to make all sites display a font style of my choice, but I'd rather not do that. Is there any fix to this? It seems like it's happening on random sites and it's definitely not their default font choice, there must be something wrong with my browser. I've attached images to show what I mean.

My FireFox automatically updated overnight and now certain websites display an Impact-like font that is hard to read. I know it's possible to make all sites display a font style of my choice, but I'd rather not do that. Is there any fix to this? It seems like it's happening on random sites and it's definitely not their default font choice, there must be something wrong with my browser. I've attached images to show what I mean.
Attached screenshots

All Replies (6)

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
more options

You can right-click and select "Inspect Element" to open the builtin Inspector with this element selected.

You can check in the Rules tab in the right panel in the Inspector what font-family is used for selected text. You can check in the Font tab in the right panel in the Inspector what font is actually used because Firefox might be using a different font than specified by the website.

If you use uBlock Origin make sure not to "block remote fonts".

Make sure you allow pages to choose their own fonts.

  • Options/Preferences -> General: Fonts & Colors -> Advanced
    [X] "Allow pages to choose their own fonts, instead of my selections above"

Start Firefox in Troubleshoot Mode to check if one of the extensions ("3-bar" menu button or Tools -> Add-ons -> Extensions) or if hardware acceleration or userChrome.css is causing the problem.

  • switch to the DEFAULT theme: "3-bar" menu button or Tools -> Add-ons -> Themes
  • do NOT click the "Refresh Firefox" button on the Troubleshoot Mode start window
Owen
Owen Mwenye swali
more options

So through the Inspector I've identified the font that is giving me issues. Is there a way to change it?

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
more options

What font is this about ? Is this about a builtin system font or about a font installed by you or by a third-party application ?

Owen
Owen Mwenye swali
more options

It's the Helvetica Compressed font that you can see in certain parts of those screen grabs. It's not something I installed, but it just started happening after a FireFox update a few days ago. Prior to that, the font was showing up different and more readable.

Modified by Owen

Owen
Owen Mwenye swali
more options

Never mind, I figured out the issue. Somehow the Helvetica font on my computer got deleted so it was using the compressed version as an alternative. Once I reinstalled Helvetica the font on the webpages went back to how it was displaying originally.

Thanks for the responses!

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
more options

See also:

  • 1714197 - font-family "Helvetica" displays the "Compressed" variant if base variants not installed

(please do not comment in bug reports
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/page.cgi?id=etiquette.html)