Public Sans

Public Sans is the open sans released by the US Web Design System for the millions of citizens who use government sites daily - clear, consistent and unornamented. Optimised from an existing open face with neutral letterforms and tuned metrics, it survives low-resolution screens and assistive contexts, battle-tested at public-service scale. The GitHub repo is the official download home and Google Fonts mirrors it, with many weights plus a variable version. For public institutions, civic and educational English sites it is near the default answer for clarity and accessibility; its restrained, trustworthy, institutional tone also suits brands that want rigour. SIL OFL 1.1, free use, modification and redistribution.

Best for government, civic and education sites, brands that want trustworthiness, long documents and form-heavy UI, and accessibility-first products. Use 400/500 for body, 700 headings, heavier plus tighter tracking at display size. Pair a neutral Chinese sans for Han text.

Licence：SIL Open Font License 1.1

The dominant permissive licence for open fonts: free commercial use, modification, embedding and redistribution. Its core duties are that derivatives stay under OFL without the Reserved Font Name, the licence text travels with the files, and the fonts themselves are never sold standalone. Works typeset with them belong wholly to you.

SIL OFL 1.1. Free for all commercial use; embeddable, webfont-safe, modifiable and redistributable. Derivatives stay OFL without the reserved name Public Sans, carry the licence text, and are never sold standalone.