How to get Microsoft core fonts on Linux

Linux is an open-source operating system. As a result, it is missing some critical components that users of proprietary operating systems enjoy. One big thing that all Linux operating systems miss out on is proprietary fonts.

The most used proprietary fonts out there today are the Microsoft Core Fonts. They’re used in many apps, development, and even graphics design projects. In this guide, we’ll go over how to set them up on Linux.

Note: not using Ubuntu, Debian, Arch Linux, Fedora, or OpenSUSE? Download the generic font package here and install the fonts by hand.

Ubuntu installation instructions

Ubuntu Linux users have it very easy when it comes to the Microsoft core fonts, as there is an easy-to-use installer that can be downloaded directly through the Ubuntu “Universe” software repository.

If you’re using Ubuntu Linux, it doesn’t matter what version (14.04, 16.04, 18.04, or newer) you will be able to start the setup process by using the command line. Press Ctrl + Alt + T or Ctrl + Shift + T on the keyboard to launch a terminal window. Then, use the Apt command below to get the “tff-mscorefonts-installer” package.

sudo apt install ttf-mscorefonts-installer

Upon running the Apt command above, Ubuntu will download and install the Microsoft Core Fonts installer to your PC, and bring up a text-based EULA. Read this EULA, and select “OK” to agree with it. You must agree to access the fonts!

After selecting “OK,” you will see another text page. Select the “Yes” option to continue.

Once you’ve selected “Yes,” the Microsoft installation tool will download all Microsoft Core Fonts to Ubuntu, install them, and set them up.

Debian installation instructions

Debian Linux, much like Ubuntu Linux, has an easy to install Microsoft font installer package in their software repositories. To start the installation, ensure you are using Debian 8, 9, or 10. For information on upgrading, click here.

Note: in addition to upgrading your Debian Linux system, you must also enable the “contrib” source. For help enabling it, read this page.

After upgrading your Debian Linux release, open up a terminal window by pressing Ctrl + Alt + T or Ctrl + Shift + T on the keyboard. From there, use the Apt-get command below to get the “ttf-mscorefonts-installer” package set up.

sudo apt-get install ttf-mscorefonts-installer

Once the Microsoft Core Fonts installer package is set up on your Debian Linux PC, the installer will automatically download several Microsoft fonts to your system and set them all up. Sit back and be patient. When the download is done, the fonts are ready to use!

Arch Linux installation instructions

On Arch Linux, there isn’t an official Microsoft installation package like on Ubuntu or Debian. However, there is an unofficial Arch Linux User repository package that downloads all of the fonts and installs them. To start the Microsoft Core Fonts installation process, open up a terminal window by pressing Ctrl + Alt + T on the keyboard. Then, use the Pacman package manager to install the Base-devel and Git packages.

sudo pacman -S git base-devel

After installing the Base-devel and Git packages, use the git clone command to download the Microsoft Core Font package.

git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/ttf-ms-fonts.git

From here, use the makepkg command to build the package, and install the various fonts on your Arch Linux system.

cd ttf-ms-fonts
makepkg -sri

Fedora/OpenSUSE installation instructions

On Fedora Linux or OpenSUSE Linux, there isn’t currently an official package available that makes installing the Microsoft Core Fonts easy. Instead, we must rely on the RPM packages and source files on SourceForge.net.

To start the installation process, open up a terminal window on your OpenSUSE or Fedora PC by pressing Ctrl + Alt + T or Ctrl + Shift + T on the keyboard. Once you’ve got a terminal window open, follow the RPM installation instructions down below that correspond with your operating system.

Fedora

The first step in installing the MS fonts on Fedora is to download the RPM package they’ve got available on SourceForge. To do this, use the following wget download command.

wget https://sourceforge.net/projects/mscorefonts2/files/rpms/msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm/download -O msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm

Once the RPM package file is downloaded to your Linux PC, you can run the Dnf package manager to load up and install the Microsoft Core Fonts instantly.

Note: you may see warnings during the installation. Ignore them, as they don’t matter.

sudo dnf install msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm -y

OpenSUSE

To get the fonts working in OpenSUSE Linux, you must download the RPM package file from the internet. To do this, use the following wget download command.

wget https://sourceforge.net/projects/mscorefonts2/files/rpms/msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm/download -O msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm

After downloading the RPM package file to your OpenSUSE Linux PC, it needs to be installed. To do that, use the Zypper package manager.

sudo zypper install msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm

Let the package install. Once it is complete, it will go through the process of automatically downloading and installing Microsoft Core Fonts to your OpenSUSE Linux PC.