What is Monotype Fonts?
Monotype Fonts is our service for font discovery, licensing and management for agencies, businesses, and enterprise customers. It’s an extensive creative workflow tool that provides a solution to the complexities of using and licensing fonts. It’s where creatives browse a wide variety of fonts, sync them to the cloud for access in their preferred design applications, and then prototype with the fonts in the tools of their choosing. Once they’ve made a decision about which font they’ll use for a particular project, they then “name” (select) which fonts are licensed and deployed in various production projects. It allows a company’s legal team to ensure the company is in compliance with license terms of their fonts. It enables a company’s IT team to keep track of font licenses and font users across global teams.
View a demo of Monotype Fonts:
Why do companies find Monotype Fonts valuable?
Monotype Fonts allows companies to license fonts in a holistic way, while enabling more efficient font discovery and licensing management. For admins, there are advanced management features, perfect for complex organizations that span multiple brands and geographies. With Monotype Fonts, legal teams can have peace of mind that their licensing needs are covered and they aren’t violating any EULAs. IT teams can keep track of font software in use across the company. Designers have access to a fantastic selection of high quality fonts for unlimited prototyping possibilities. Brands have lots of flexibility; some Monotype Fonts plans include the ability to “swap” out production fonts quarterly.
While the traditional way of licensing through e-commerce sites is still valuable for smaller companies and individual creators, businesses need a different solution. Monotype Fonts provides a much simpler way for businesses to access and manage fonts. Large companies often manage hundreds - if not thousands - of fonts and licenses; having individual employees buying each font a-la-carte via e-commerce often leads to inevitable accidental under-licensing. Many simply don’t know what fonts their company is using. We figured this out through lots of user testing and research, and Monotype Fonts was developed to solve the problems faced by our largest customers.
I’m confused. I thought this was Mosaic?
Monotype Fonts was previously named Mosaic. The name changed in November 2020. We renamed it to simplify the customer experience when introducing customers to Monotype. Font licensing is already so complex, so simplifying the name meant one less item to explain. It’s the same product, just with a new name (and a ton of great new features!).
How do I earn money from my fonts being in Monotype Fonts?
Before we get into the details, it is important to understand that we’re selling term-based licensing, not fonts. In general, customers are purchasing the rights to license fonts, and they may or may not know up front which fonts they’ll need for the duration of their plan.
Because of this, we have a unique royalty model for subscription-based revenue. Foundries are paid quarterly, the portion of our quarterly revenue that represent your foundry's fonts' contribution to the platform. This is calculated using three proxies: % of all named fonts, % of all synced fonts, and % of all earnings on our e-commerce channels.
Learn more about the royalty model for Monotype Fonts here.
How does Monotype Fonts benefit my foundry?
With Monotype Fonts, your fonts are in the hands of creatives at top global brands. Not only do top brands have access to your fonts, the fonts are very easy to deploy since licensing happens prior to the creative process. Monotype Fonts removes the typical licensing roadblocks for designers at large companies; once your fonts are in Monotype Fonts, designers can design with them and easily deploy them in production environments without expense reports or other time consuming paperwork.
The orders are term-based and renewable, not perpetual, so customers pay to use your fonts over time. Since customers using Monotype Fonts are different from traditional e-commerce users, Monotype Fonts revenue will supplement e-commerce revenue.
The business model of Monotype Fonts is designed to ensure proper font licensing; it’s good for the type industry as a whole.
How and when am I paid royalties for Monotype Fonts revenue?
Revenue from Monotype Fonts is paid in your quarterly earnings from Monotype. These payments are sent to the payment method you have set up in your account. You’ll receive a PDF and CSV statement from royaltysupport@monotype.com 15-30 days prior to the payment.
Royalties associated with fonts being synced or named as production fonts will have a Sales Order Number value like “MTFonts_202303”. MTFonts indicates the sale is associated with Monotype Fonts, and 202303 indicates the earnings were for the quarter ended March 2023. Read more about royalty statements. We’re currently in the process of building a new sales reporting tool in Foundry Platform (yay!) which will reflect the way we do business today and be a much better experience than the legacy statements you receive today.
What do customers pay for Monotype Fonts?
You can see our pricing tiers and add-on prices on monotypefonts.com. Larger orders fall into the Pro or Unlimited plans and are configurable based on the company’s needs and licensing history, and are typically in line with the predefined prices for add-ons listed on the site.
Orders are term-based and invoiced yearly. Most orders are 3-5 years. Monotype Fonts is a subscription in that revenue is recurring, however it is not a typical subscription like Netflix or Spotify. Companies pay for the subscription to Monotype Fonts, not individual users. Companies often work with Monotype to deploy Monotype Fonts for multiple teams, projects, and regions. As Monotype Fonts is a term-based enterprise solution, customers cannot cancel their subscription anytime they want (like you can with Netflix, Spotify, or Adobe).
How do customers buy Monotype Fonts?
Customers buy Monotype Fonts online at monotypefonts.com or by working with someone from our enterprise sales teams. Our salespeople are located around the world, and work with customers in many different languages. Monotypefonts.com is localized for the US, UK, France, and Germany, with more languages to come.
What customers use Monotype Fonts?
Monotype Fonts is used by a broad spectrum of brands and agencies across a range of industries, from small design studios all the way up to large international corporations. Our customers include major streaming platforms, automotive brands, consumer packaged goods companies, and prominent marketing and design firms.
How is Monotype Fonts different from Adobe Fonts?
Adobe Fonts is a feature to enhance Adobe’s other creative products, and used by anyone with Adobe subscription.
Monotype Fonts is our service for font discovery, licensing and management. It is a holistic solution that includes font licensing, which makes it different from Adobe Fonts. In order for individuals to access the fonts available through Monotype Fonts, they (or their company) must already have purchased an account and be permitted login rights. Revenue from Monotype Fonts does not necessarily reflect usage and is allocated multiple ways: up-front access to the fonts available through Monotype Fonts, for prototyping, and/or for “named fonts” which customers deploy and license in production projects.
What foundries are currently in Monotype Fonts?
All foundries on the latest agreement and part of the Foundry Program are distributed in Monotype Fonts. Additionally, all fonts owned by Monotype are available to customers in Monotype Fonts.
How often are new foundries added to Monotype Fonts?
We are expanding the inventory in Monotype Fonts to provide an even better experience for customers. We are adding additional fonts and foundries in batches at a regular cadence. We will not flood Monotype Fonts with fonts from many newly-added foundries at the same time, and we spread out any new foundry additions so that each foundry added has a chance to shine. New foundries added to Monotype Fonts are featured in marketing emails sent to all Monotype Fonts users.
How can my fonts be included in Monotype Fonts?
By joining the Foundry Program, your fonts are added to Monotype Fonts. Join the foundry program by signing the latest distribution agreement.
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Your foundry must be on the latest distribution agreement.
Our latest distribution agreement allows us to include your fonts in Monotype Fonts. Check to see if your agreement is up to date here. If not, upgrade your agreement with a few quick clicks!
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Your fonts must be professional.
All fonts included in Monotype Fonts are well-designed and high-quality. Foundries whose fonts are included in Monotype Fonts thoroughly test their fonts before releasing them and properly encode the fonts to meet modern OpenType standards. We only add foundries that have fonts with very low instances of customer support issues or refunds on our e-commerce sites.
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Your fonts must be in-demand.
All fonts included in Monotype Fonts meet our customers needs. This could happen a few different ways. We include fonts that are very well-known and consistently in demand. However, we also include fonts from lesser-known foundries because they fill a specific niche need for our customers. For example, we may include a foundry that specializes in a specific style of fonts. We also include foundries that produce fonts that have extensive language coverage in key languages important to our global customers. Or we may include a foundry that doesn’t have any hits yet but are producing fonts that are fresh, edgy, and setting trends.
How do I add my fonts to Monotype Fonts?
Once you’re included in Monotype Fonts, any fonts you upload through Foundry Platform will be added to Monotype Fonts around the same time they are released to our e-commerce sites.
Can I get a demo account for Monotype Fonts?
Sure! You can do a 14-day trial online. Visit https://www.monotypefonts.com/ to get started.