VFonts by Typogram

Variable Fonts Control

Inspiration

As typography enthusiasts and founders of Typogram, we noticed a significant gap in Canva's offerings: the lack of advanced typography features, particularly Variable Font support. We were inspired to bridge this gap, bringing professional-grade typography tools to Canva's diverse, global community of users. Our background as an all-female cofounded startup, combined with our diverse identities, fueled our passion to democratize access to sophisticated design tools.

What it does

VFonts by Typogram is a free Canva plugin that introduces advanced typography features to users, requiring no signup or paywall. It offers Variable Font Support, providing a vast collection of variable fonts with unprecedented control over font characteristics. Our innovative Justify Alignment Tool automatically adjusts font size to create perfect rectangular text blocks. These features bring professional-grade typography capabilities to Canva's user-friendly platform.

How we built it

We integrated Variable Font technology and custom typography tools into Canva's platform, focusing on user-friendly design and seamless functionality. Our development process prioritized performance optimization and cross-device compatibility.

Challenges we ran into

Our main challenges included integrating advanced typography within Canva's framework, optimizing performance for numerous variable fonts, and creating an intuitive interface for complex controls while keeping the plugin free.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We're proud to be the first to bring Variable Font support to Canva, creating an innovative Justify Alignment Tool, and developing a completely free tool that offers professional-grade typography features. Our plugin successfully bridges the gap between accessibility and advanced design capabilities.

What we learned

This project deepened our understanding of Canva's development ecosystem and reinforced the importance of balancing advanced features with user-friendly design. We gained valuable insights into simplifying complex typography concepts for a broad audience.

What's next for VFonts by Typogram

Looking ahead, we plan to expand our collection of variable fonts and introduce more advanced typography features based on user feedback. We're particularly excited about our upcoming "variable gradient" feature, which will create a special text effect using gradual changes in variable parameters for each individual letter in a text object. We'll also focus on creating comprehensive tutorials, exploring partnerships with type foundries, and continuously improving performance and compatibility across different devices and projects.