Thanks a billion! Ubuntu on Google Webfonts

Kudos to everyone using the Ubuntu Font Family on their websites as a web font! This week the total to date reached over one billion requests—and it’ll go up even faster if you add Ubuntu Mono and Ubuntu Condensed to your sites too.

Shortly after the Ubuntu Font Family was added to Google Webfonts directory, Bruno and Dalton Maag team noticed that there had been 12 million API requests in the first month. I think you’ll agree that the current figure dwarfs that! Here’s the announcement from back then, now blown away:

Only added recently into Google’s font directory, the Ubuntu font family has already been viewed over 12 Million times around the world.

We expect the fonts to become even more popular once the font family is available in all its weights, and the core set is extended with Arabic and Hebrew, too.

Bruno and Dalton Maag, just a few months ago

I had a feeling that the usage might ramp up and now the those API requests to the Google Webfonts have reached one billion (10⁹) or as David Wurtz, product manager for Google Webfonts put it:

…A big milestone!

David Wurtz, Product Manager, Google Web Fonts Team

Version 0.80 expansion

The statistics are not the only big milestone recently. Ubuntu Font Family 0.80 was released at the end of September 2011. In the release announcement it introduces the five additional .ttf files:

• Ubuntu Mono (four styles)
• Ubuntu Condensed (one style)

Hinting work continues on the Ubuntu Mono with Vincent Connare at Dalton Maag working to perfect the distortions to improve the rendering at low resolutions.

Mark Shuttleworth (who along with other people has been testing the Ubuntu Mono for nearly a year) is so happy with the Ubnutu Mono that in bug #865013 “Ubuntu Mono” has been made the default system monospace font in Ubuntu 11.10. For Kubuntu, Xubuntu and friends the monospace fonts are also shipped in release 11.10, but are not yet set as default.

Get them now!

I’ll hand it over to Dave Crossland to do the summing up. Dave is an independent font consultant working with the Google Web Fonts team who’s been heavily involved with building up the number of libre and open fonts available in the directory and knows intimately what works and what doesn’t:

The Ubuntu Font Family is one of the most popular fonts available in Google Web Fonts, …thanks to its excellent quality in design and technical engineering, and also its extensive character set that supports many languages. As more and more people learn about why web fonts are important, it’s great that the Ubuntu project has shared this high quality typeface and font family with the world!

Dave Crossland, independent consultant to Google Web Fonts team

To view and use the Ubuntu Font Family via Google Web Fonts; there’s a choice of Ubuntu (proportional ×8), Ubuntu Mono (monospace ×4) and Ubuntu Condensed (condensed ×1). You are expressly welcome and encouraged to share and use the webfonts on your own sites!