Striking Experimental Typefaces for Unique Web Designs

Stray from sans-serif to give your designs an edge with experimental typefaces.

A typeface lies at the heart of your design, holding both aesthetic and practical value, and having a major impact on website visitors’ initial impression of your website. As such, your choice of typography is just as important as any other design choice you make when starting a new web project. Yet, many creators still overlook the importance of this decision.

We’ve pulled together experimental typeface best practices, tips, trends, and recommendations to help you bring extra edge and flair to your web creations.

Defining Experimental Typefaces

First, the basics. While lacking a clear definition — and often used as shorthand for anything remotely unique looking — “experimental typefaces” can be more simply defined as anything that steps outside of the boundaries of traditional typographic design rules.

Subtle, more traditional typefaces can lend themselves as pragmatic tools for communicating text-heavy content. Yet, experimental typefaces can help you push the boundaries of your design, acting as a visual force to showcase your brand’s creativity and individualism.

That said, accessibility is highly important, so any experimental typefaces you choose to work with also need to be carefully paired with a more traditional typeface that can be used for text-heavy sections of your online content. Think of these experimental typefaces as flourishes, used as an eye-catching and engaging visual in hero sections, rather than brandished across a whole design.

How to Use Experimental Typefaces in Web Design

There are a number of types of experimental typefaces and ways to use them in web designs. To help give you some ideas about which artistic direction could work for you, we’ve picked out a few of the most popular uses.

Animated

Experimental typefaces are often animated, injecting movement into your content. Using no-code web design tools, such as Vev’s pre-coded typewriter and animated words elements, you can quickly and easily test out animating experimental typefaces in your own designs. This example from ChainZoku creates an exciting welcome for users as they enter the site, and sets the scene for the unique content that follows.

Interactive

This is a newer form of experimental typeface, and has arisen primarily due to the rise and popularity of interactive web design. Including interactive text in web-based content is a great way to bring visual emphasis to key messaging in your design and boost reader engagement. In the following example for designer and photographer Alon Peres, hovering over the shapes spelling “ALON” causes them to morph into more identifiable typography, in a simple yet rewarding user interaction.

Three-dimensional

If you want to engage your audience and create a lasting positive impression, your site design needs to offer something out of the ordinary. While there are many techniques for achieving this — like scrollytelling and parallax — 3D web design remains a solid choice. Refokus’ 2022 Year in Review uses 3D typography in the header to immediately grab attention, as well as show off their creativity as a web design studio.

Experimental Typefaces to Try

There are thousands of experimental typefaces out there for you to explore. To cut through the noise, we’ve picked out a diverse collection that tests the waters of traditional type rules by using anything from abstract forms to animation and symbols.

WildWaffle

Uniquely delicious, WildWaffle was created by PizzaTypefaces, a French type design studio run by Adrien Midzic and Luc Borho. This is one of three sub-fonts in the Forno typeface family, and is a geometric genre font. When looking for an experimental typeface, font accessibility should still be at the forefront of your mind, especially if you are looking for a typeface that will be used for titles or large bodies of text. Luckily, WildWaffle is one of the more legible experimental typefaces out there, and best use cases would include titles, headers, navigation menus, or a short piece of display text.

Webster

Animated experimental typefaces are becoming one of the biggest trends in web design, and Webster is one that doesn’t disappoint. Inspired by the proportions of Helvetica Bold, at its core it is a simple type made out of dots, lines, and faces that give it a clean and geometric feel. It is fully customizable in color, shape, and even animation, making it a stand-out for adding spark to web pages. Use as a heading for a creative and engaging welcome to users who land on your web page.

Success Sans

Success Sans is part of the new NaN Success family, which is creatively described by its designers as “an essay on titling typography(…) the 3 sub-families all answer, separately and together, different questions and challenges raised by typography.” At its essence, it has been designed to challenge and question traditional typography. Like WildWaffle, it is also up there as one of the clearer experimental typefaces, and can be used in a variety of ways across your web design.

BASE&BLOOM

Designed by Peter Bushuev as a response to the lack of display sans types and over-saturation of flamboyant serifs, Base&Bloom is a fusion of the two. The “base” is formed from a geometric sans serif type, whilst the “bloom” adds some flourish with ornate high-contrast calligraphic forms. The forms are slightly challenging, creating a sense of mystery and fun when used in bold headings — but it’s probably best to avoid using this for paragraphs!

Paper Waves

Paper Waves is a 3D font using paper in the structure rather than as the more traditional background. Tapping into the organic shapes visual design trend, this experimental typeface is an artistic alternative that can be used across design projects, from website headlines to promotional campaign assets.

Modu

Modu is a geometric experimental typeface that also looks stunning in 3D. Whilst it is quite decorative, with a bit of thought and planning, it could easily be woven into the fabrics of a design that gives the typeface room to breathe. With this in mind, it would be best used for an artistic hero section headline.

Isotype

Another animated experimental typeface, Isotype is named after what it is: a faux 3D isometric typeface. This typeface has a number of in and out animations, controlled by two separate sliders, offering you full control over the speed and easing. Use this to add some oomph to headlines and phrases, and give your webpage a fun edge.

Monalesa

For something a bit more elegant, try Monalesa. Made up of gorgeous ligatures, and with a whole host of alternative glyphs, it's a versatile experimental typeface that works well across many projects.

More font inspiration is waiting for you

If you are getting started on a project in `Vev, we have resources you can dip in and out of for scrollytelling tips, animated text ideas, and more. As a next step why not check out our article about the "Best Google Font Combinations for Your Next Web Project".