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German blackletter print type

Fraktur: Free Font, Alphabet and Generator

Fraktur is the type of old German books, newspapers and certificates. Here you will find the alphabet with the long s and typical ligatures, a generator for your own text, and a free font to download.

Convert text to old script Get the free fonts
Liebe Grüße aus Großmutters Zeit

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What is Fraktur?

Fraktur (from Latin “fractura”, break) is a blackletter print type: the curves of the letters are “broken” into angular parts. It emerged in the early 16th century in the circle of Emperor Maximilian I and became the main print type of the German-speaking world, used for Bibles, books, newspapers and certificates for over 400 years.

With the decree of 1941, Fraktur disappeared from schools and government offices. Today it mostly appears on beer bottles, newspaper mastheads, pub signs and certificates.

What helps when reading

  • The long ſ looks almost like an f, only without the crossbar on the right.
  • Typical ligatures: ch, ck, tz and ſt are set as joined letters.
  • Capitals such as A, U, B, V and K, R are easy to mix up at first, so compare them in the chart below.
Capital letters

The Fraktur alphabet

A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
W
X
Y
Z
Ä
Ö
Ü
Lowercase letters

a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
l
m
n
o
p
q
r
s
t
u
v
w
x
y
z
ä
ö
ü
ß
ſ (long s)
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Generator

Fraktur generator: convert text to Fraktur

Tip: type an ancestor's name to see how it looks in the old script, then look for that shape in the record. If an s comes out wrong, type ſ or s in the word yourself; words that already contain an ſ stay as they are.

Text recognition

Fraktur to text: turn a photo or scan into modern letters

Upload a photo from an old book or newspaper, and the recognition writes the text out in modern letters.

Recognition runs in your browser; your image is not uploaded. It reads printed Fraktur from books, newspapers and certificates, and the text comes out in German. Words marked like this are uncertain. It cannot read handwriting in Kurrent or Sütterlin. It works best with a straight, sharp crop of one text column. Recognition model: frak2021 from Mannheim University Library, text recognition: Tesseract.

Download the Fraktur font for free

For Word, Pages and more: a TTF file with a free license.

Go to the fonts

Frequently asked questions about Fraktur

Is there a free Fraktur font?
Yes. You can download Langula Fraktur for free. It is based on the free UnifrakturMaguntia, includes the umlauts, the long s and the typical ligatures, and is released under the SIL Open Font License, so you can also use it commercially.
Is Fraktur handwriting?
No, Fraktur is a print type. The matching handwriting was Kurrent and, from 1915, Sütterlin.
Is this the same as Pennsylvania German fraktur?
They are related. Pennsylvania German fraktur is a folk art of decorated documents such as birth and baptismal certificates, named after the type it often imitates. This page is about the print type itself.
When was Fraktur used?
From the 16th century until 1941 it was the usual print type in the German-speaking world. After that, it was replaced by Antiqua by decree.
When is the long s used?
As a rough rule, the long ſ stands at the start and in the middle of a syllable, and the round s at the end of a word or syllable: “ſagen” and “Haus”, but also “Hausſchlüſſel”, because a new word begins there.

More on old German script

Old German ScriptAll three alphabets and the reading trainerSütterlin ScriptThe German school script from 1915 to 1941Kurrent ScriptGerman handwriting since the 16th centuryOld German Script GeneratorConvert text to old script, save as image or PDFFree Old German FontsSütterlin, Kurrent and Fraktur to download