Tibetan fonts

Tibetan fonts are difficult to produce due to the unlimited number of possible glyphs. While there are only a well defined set of ‘standard’ Tibetan syllables, there exists many extensions because of Sanskrit transliterations (e.g. mantras), Chinese transliterations, and Dzongkha shortcuts. Due to all of those extensions, it is virtually impossible to generate a ‘complete’ Tibetan font by providing all possible glyphs.

Microsoft had develop a system that could dynamically render new glyph variants, but the resulting Himalaya font doesn’t work on non-Windows platforms and lacks the esthetics of preconceived glyphs.

So Tibetan fonts either look artificial or are incomplete…

For more information about the history and development of the Tibetan scripts, see History of Tibetan script.

Using fonts with an open license is important

If you are working on Tibetan projects that involve Sanskrit stacks (mantras), Chinese transliterations or Dzongkha shortcuts, then there will be the situation that a given font doesn’t correctly render a stack that is needed. In such a situation, it is possible to extend a given font by providing additional glyphs for such a special case. See Tibetan font creation for details.

If the font you are using is not under a free license, then you won’t be able to distribute any changes that you have made to a font to add needed glyphs.

Recommendation

The Noto and Babelstone families of fonts are currently under activate development, so updates, improvements and bug-fixes are more likely.

• Google’s Noto-Fonts project

• Andrew West’s Babelstone project

Overview of freely available Unicode Tibetan fonts

The following list contains a number of fonts with good coverage of the most common glyphs and open licenses.

Font name	Sample	Glyphs	Comment
Tibetan Machine Uni		5110	Version 1.901 2007 (beta for v 2.00), one of the first Unicode fonts
DDC Uchen		3193	Version 1.000 preliminary, Chris Fynn’s font
Jomolhari		3333	Version 1.000, Chris Fynn’s font
Babelstone Tibetan		4019	Version 10.008 April 21, 2022, extended version of Jomolhari
Babelstone Tibetan Slim		4019	Version 10.008 April 21, 2022, extended version of Jomolhari, slim
Noto Serif Tibetan		1891	Google’s Noto font, with many different weights. Linked Release version 2.001 (2022) has bugs, see comment[1] for a solution.
Noto Sans Tibetan			Some applications (eBook readers) insist on fonts from “Noto Sans” family, and Tibetan is simply a Serif script. Visit the FontRenamer project to download a Tibetan serif font internally renamed to Noto Sans Tibetan for use in GUI applications.

Text samples[2]

Longer text samples, created with Scribus.

• Scribus document

• PDF version

Samples

Qomolangma Tibetan Unicode Fonts

These fonts are free for non-commercial use only.

Download the Qomolangma collection here. (at Yalasoo font page)

Uchen fonts

Font name	Sample	Glyphs	Comment
Qomolangma-Subtitle		1561	Version 1.00, 2013, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Title		1561	Version 1.00, 2013, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Uchen Sarchen		1563	Version 2.00, 2008, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Uchen Sarchung		1563	Version 2.00, 2008, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Uchen Suring		1564	Version 2.00, 2009, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Uchen Sutung		1477	Version 2.00, 2008, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab

Artistic variations

Font name	Sample	Glyphs	Comment
Qomolangma-Art		1562	Version 1.00 June 18, 2014, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Dunhang		1562	Version 1.00, 2015, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Woodblock		1561	Version 2.00, 2014, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab

Cursive variants

See Tibetan calligraphy.

Font name	Sample	Glyphs	Comment
Qomolangma-Betsu		1404	dbu med script (Umê) used for scriptures. Version 2.00, 2008, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Drutsa		1415	dbu med script (Umê) used for documents. Version 2.00, 2008, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Chuyig		1655	Version 2.00, 2009, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Tsumachu		1526	Version 2.00, 2008, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Tsutong		1562	Version 2.00, 2008, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Edict		1562	Version 1.00, 2013, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab
Qomolangma-Tsuring		1562	Version 2.00, 2008, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab

Mongolian, 'phags-pa (Tibetan variant)

Qomolangma-horyig
	Qomolangma-horyig A vertical 'phags pa script that uses Tibetan letters. 1562 glyphs. Version 1.00, 2013, China Tibetology Research Center, Tashi Tsering and Wangdra Gyab Note: this font encodes 'phags pa incorrectly on the Unicode-pages of Tibetan (0x0f00), whereas 'phags pa has it’s own Unicode page at 0xA840. Due to the use of the Tibetan page, horyig must be manually turned 90°.	A 'phags pa inscriptions on an Italian tombstone of the 14th century.[3][4]

See also: 'Phags-pa Wikipedia

OS-specific fonts

• macOS only fonts Kokonor, Kailasa

• Windows only fonts, Himalaya

Remarks and History

For more information about the history and development of the Tibetan scripts, see History of Tibetan script.

Chris Fynn was one of the first Unicode font pioneers. His fonts Jomolhari and DDC Uchen, available with free Open SIL licenses, where the basis of many developments.

The Babelstone Project by Andrew West has continued the work on Jomolhari and updated the font to newer Unicode standards and extended the glyph coverage.

The Tibetan & Himalayan Library at Virginia University had bought the rights on the proprietary Tibetan Machine font with help of the Trace Foundation and made it freely available as one of the first Unicode fonts.

Google’s Noto font family provides Tibetan support and free support for virtually every language on earth for a large number of platforms.

The Qomolangma font project at Yalasoo, created with support by the Central Tibetan Relief Committee, CTRC.

Pre-Unicode fonts

Old digital Tibetan files often use ancient pre-Unicode fonts. The following list contains the most frequent types. All of those fonts use their own proprietary encoding, check Conversion of old Tibetan text for information on how to convert old documents to modern Unicode.

• TibetanMachine (free download: pktc.org) and TibetanCaligraphic, TibetanClassic, DzongkhaCaligraphic (commercial fonts: www.pktc.org)

• TibetanMachineWeb (free download: www.pktc.org)

• Tibetan Modern A (free download: virginia.edu.)

• Robillard (Ltibetan, etc) (free download: UDP website).

• Sambhota including Dedris, Eedris, Esama/b/c, Sama/b/c, Samw (was a free download if only used to view ACIP documents, otherwise commercial license required, see updated at: nitartha.net.)

• TIBETBT (free download via THDL

• fonts derived from the “P.R.C. National Standard for Tibetan (Extension A)” (aka “Set A”). For a documentation see Chris Fynn’s website: Tibetan Extension A. Chris Fynn’s Jomolhari supports this standard.

• TCRC Bod-Yig, TCRC Youtsoweb, TCRC Youtso (free download: www.tchrd.org

External sources

• Tibetan fonts at University of Virginia

• Qomolangma Tibetan Unicode Fonts

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[1]

Release-version of Noto Serif Tibetan, version 2.001, renders the glyph དྡྷི incorrectly. A fix is available at noto development repository. See discussion at bug report.

[2]

Sample text by Nāgārjuna taken from Lotsawa House

[3]

(Jesus on the Silk Road by Dale A. Johnson p.73)

[4]

Mongol elements in Western medieval art