Do the brands that own their letters read in them?
Mostly, yes. Of the world’s 100 most valuable brands, 74 have letters of their own. On the 69 of their front pages I could open, 49 set the words you read in them too, not only the headlines.
Ebbi · 20 October 2026
A brand’s own font is for its name and its headlines. The small words, the ones you actually read, go in something plain. Ask how the big brands do it, and that is the answer you get.
So I looked. Not at what brands say about their fonts: at their own front pages, every word on them.
The hundred.
I took the world’s 100 most valuable brands as Interbrand ranks them for 2025, from Apple to DHL, and on 20 October 2026 I opened each one’s own front page, on a laptop and on a phone, the way a stranger meets it the first time. For every line of words on every page I asked the browser two things: which font the page asks for, and which font it actually drew. And I read every font file each page loaded, for the line inside it that says whose it is.
That line is plain. “San Francisco is a trademark of Apple Inc.” “Copyright 2018, 2023-2025 Airbnb.” “TCCC Unity is trademark of The Coca-Cola Company.”
Who owns their letters.
74 of the hundred have letters made for them. Most were drawn new for the brand, like Apple’s San Francisco, Netflix Sans or Airbnb’s Cereal. Fourteen are fonts anyone can license, redrawn and renamed for one brand: Mastercard’s Mark for MC, HSBC’s Univers Next for HSBC, IKEA’s own Noto.
A few keep theirs off their front page, and I found them where the brand, or the people who drew the letters, say so: Cisco’s, YouTube’s, and Honda’s, which has been on the computer of every Honda employee since May 2025.
For the other 26 I found none. On the 20 of their pages that opened, the words are set in fonts anyone can license or download, from Graphik and Helvetica Now to Roboto and Source Sans.
What their front pages read in.
The world’s 100 most valuable brands, by what their front page did with their own letters
Five of the 74 front pages would not open for me: Louis Vuitton, Oracle, LEGO, eBay and Gucci. Of the other 69, 49 set their reading in their own letters: Apple, Samsung, Toyota, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, Mercedes-Benz, Disney, Netflix, IBM, Visa, Airbnb, Uber and 37 more. Not just the headlines: the lines under them, the links, the small print at the foot of the page.
Twelve show their letters only in places. Amazon sets its headings in its own Ember and its reading in Arial. Nike sets its big words in its own version of Futura, and the rest in Helvetica Now. Nescafé puts its own letters in its headlines and its reading in Gotham.
Eight leave their letters off their front page altogether. Cisco’s reads in Inter, YouTube’s in Roboto, its owner Google’s font, Honda’s in Avenir Next, HP’s in Forma DJR.
Asking is not getting.
Three of the 49 ask for their own letters and don’t always get them. Microsoft’s page asks for its Segoe from a file on its own server that isn’t there: the address answers “not found”. On a Windows computer, which carries Segoe already, the page reads in Microsoft’s letters anyway. On a Mac or an iPhone, it reads in Helvetica.
Adobe and Shopify ask for theirs with an instruction to wait for no one: if the font has not arrived the moment the page is first drawn, the browser sets the page in another font and keeps it for that visit. On my first visit to each, the reading came in a stand-in. Come back, and it is there.
Google goes the other way. On a laptop its front page reads in Arial. On an Android phone it asks for Roboto, the font Google drew for Android, which the phone already carries.
For your brand.
So if your letters are only for your name and your headlines, you are in good company, Nike, Amazon and Nescafé among it. But among the brands that own their letters, you are the exception: seven in ten that I could read set their reading in theirs.
What letters of your own cost is another count, and I made it once: Does a brand’s own font save money?
Of the world’s 100 most valuable brands, 49 set the words on their front page in letters of their own.
How I counted it.
The hundred: Interbrand’s Best Global Brands 2025, as listed on its own page on 20 October 2026. Each brand’s front page: its own .com, or its own main address where the .com belongs to someone else, opened that day from the United States as a first visit, on a laptop screen 1,440 pixels wide and a phone screen 360 pixels wide. A brand’s own letters: a font made for it, by the words inside its files, their name, copyright or trademark, or, where they are not on the page, by the brand’s or its maker’s own words. Its reading: every word set between 12 and 20 pixels, its running text and its small print. Reads in them: half of those words or more in its own letters, by the font the page asks for, checked against the font the browser drew. Where the two parted, I found out why, and it is said above.
What the count cannot show.
One page: the front page, not the whole site, the app or the packaging. One country: the pages as they open in the United States; Toyota, BMW, Hyundai and Honda opened on their American company’s page. One day: pages change. Eleven front pages refused a machine like mine, five of them brands with letters of their own. What a brand paid for its letters. And reading itself: which letters are easier to read was never asked.
The count, to download.
All hundred brands, each with its own letters if it has them, the proof, and the words on its front page in them on a laptop and on a phone, as a table to download, free to reuse with credit (CC BY 4.0). If a re-count changes a number, it will say so here, with its date.
To cite. Ebbi, “Do the brands that own their letters read in them?”, ebbi.ai/seen/do-brands-read-in-their-own-fonts/, 20 October 2026.
Sources. Every page read on 20 October 2026.
- Interbrand, “Best Global Brands 2025”
- Each brand’s own front page, and the font files it loaded
- Honda, “Honda Global Font: Philosophy and Design” · Google Design, “YouTube Sans” · Lineto, “PayPal” · Bold Monday, “General Electric”
- It’s Nice That, on Booking.com’s typeface by Colophon, 25 August 2015 · ZeCraft, “Sephora”
- eBay Playbook, “Our typeface” · BlackRock Design, “Typography” · Typeroom, “Precious cuts of type”, on Cartier’s typefaces · Monotype, “Fashion-forward fonts”
- Wikipedia, “Segoe” · Klim Type Foundry, “Sons”
