Trade Gothic Font
The newsy American gothic behind countless headlines
Jackson Burke · American gothic sans serif · 1948 · × Paid license (in Adobe Fonts)
Oswald · closest free match to Trade Gothic


Illustrations of the Trade Gothic style made for DaFontFonts. Letterforms are approximate; check the official specimen before you buy.
Download Trade Gothic
- License:
- Paid license (in Adobe Fonts)
- Font Type:
- Paid
- Download:
- Free alternative: Oswald (OFL-1.1)
- Format:
- TTF
- Total Files:
- 6 styles + licence
Trade Gothic itself is not free to download. This button gives you Oswald, the closest free match, licensed for commercial use. Trade Gothic Next on Adobe Fonts
About Trade Gothic
Jackson Burke began designing Trade Gothic for Linotype in 1948 and kept adding weights and widths for more than a decade. It is an American gothic sans with a slightly irregular, newsy character, less polished than Swiss grotesques but more direct and practical.
Its Bold Condensed No. 20 style became a fixture of newspaper headlines, advertising and event posters, and condensed Trade Gothic is still common in sports and athletic branding. Linotype released an updated Trade Gothic Next in 2008.
Where Trade Gothic works best
- Sports and athletic branding
- Newspaper and magazine headlines
- Event and concert posters
- Advertising
Free alternatives to Trade Gothic
Open-licence fonts with a comparable feel, every one verified free for commercial use and downloadable from DaFontFonts.
Oswald is a reworking of classic Alternate Gothic styles from the same American gothic tradition, and it is the standard free stand-in for Trade Gothic Bold Condensed headlines.
Archivo Narrow covers Trade Gothic's condensed text styles: tables, captions, and labels that need a compact, businesslike sans.
Roboto Condensed is a dependable substitute for Trade Gothic Condensed in interfaces and data-heavy layouts, though it is smoother and less characterful.
Barlow Condensed has a slightly rounded, friendly take on the condensed grotesque, close to Trade Gothic's proportions with a full weight range and italics.
PT Sans Narrow is a loose match limited to two weights, but it handles the space-saving body-text jobs Trade Gothic Condensed often gets in editorial work.
Trade Gothic is a trademark of its owner. DaFontFonts does not host or distribute the Trade Gothic font files; download and licence links go to the official source.
Questions
Is Trade Gothic free?
No. Trade Gothic is a paid Linotype family, and Trade Gothic Next is available through Adobe Fonts. Oswald and Barlow Condensed are free alternatives.
Who designed Trade Gothic?
Jackson Burke designed Trade Gothic for Linotype, starting in 1948.
What is Trade Gothic Bold Condensed No. 20?
It is the famous heavy, narrow style of Trade Gothic used for headlines, posters and sports graphics.
What is the closest free font to Trade Gothic?
Oswald and Barlow Condensed are close for condensed headlines, and Archivo Narrow works well for text.
More popular fonts
- Ghastly Panic Font
- Akira Font
- Algerian Font
- Arial Font
- Avant Garde Font
- Avenir Font
- Baskerville Font
- Bauhaus Font
- Benguiat Font
- Bodoni Font
- Brandon Grotesque Font
- Broadway Font
- Brush Script Font
- Calibri Font
- Canela Font
- Caslon Font
- Century Gothic Font
- Clarendon Font
- Comic Sans Font
- Cooper Black Font
- Copperplate Font
- Didot Font
- DIN Font
- Edwardian Script Font
- Eurostile Font
- Franklin Gothic Font
- Frutiger Font
- Futura Font
- Garamond Font
- Gill Sans Font
- Gilroy Font
- Gotham Font
- Helvetica Font
- Impact Font
- Minion Pro Font
- Museo Sans Font
- Myriad Pro Font
- Optima Font
- Papyrus Font
- Proxima Nova Font
- Rockwell Font
- Satoshi Font
- SF Pro Font
- Sofia Pro Font
- Tiempos Font
- Times New Roman Font
- Trajan Font
- Univers Font
- Verdana Font