Fonts like Cairo
12 open fonts whose letters are closest to Cairo, ranked by a glyph comparison. All free for commercial use.
Quick answer
The closest open font to Cairo is Mako (similarity 82), then Exo and Encode Sans Semi Condensed. Mako is released under the SIL Open Font License 1.1 and is free for commercial use.
Side-by-side comparison
Top lookalikes compared at the same size Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
Top lookalikes: licence permissions
Commercial rights side by sideMakoOFL-1.1
Commercial workAllowed
Logo or wordmarkAllowed
WebsiteAllowed, with conditions
App or gameAllowed, with conditions
Modify the fontAllowed, with conditions
Share the font fileAllowed, with conditions
Sell the font fileNot allowed
No credit needed in your workAllowed
ExoOFL-1.1
Commercial workAllowed
Logo or wordmarkAllowed
WebsiteAllowed, with conditions
App or gameAllowed, with conditions
Modify the fontAllowed, with conditions
Share the font fileAllowed, with conditions
Sell the font fileNot allowed
No credit needed in your workAllowed
Encode Sans Semi CondensedOFL-1.1
Commercial workAllowed
Logo or wordmarkAllowed
WebsiteAllowed, with conditions
App or gameAllowed, with conditions
Modify the fontAllowed, with conditions
Share the font fileAllowed, with conditions
Sell the font fileNot allowed
No credit needed in your workAllowed
All 12 open lookalikes, ranked
Comparison based on letter shape and edge texture#1
Mako OFL-1.1
Similarity 82 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#2
Exo OFL-1.1
Similarity 80 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#3
Encode Sans Semi Condensed OFL-1.1
Similarity 78 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#4
Encode Sans OFL-1.1
Similarity 78 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#5
Saira Semi Condensed OFL-1.1
Similarity 78 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#6
Murecho OFL-1.1
Similarity 77 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#7
Doppio One OFL-1.1
Similarity 77 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#8
Inria Sans OFL-1.1
Similarity 77 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#9
Merriweather Sans OFL-1.1
Similarity 76 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#10
Voces OFL-1.1
Similarity 76 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#11
Noto Sans Display OFL-1.1
Similarity 75 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
#12
Anek Telugu OFL-1.1
Similarity 75 — 100 = identical letters, 0 = an average pair
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow
Fonts made for other scripts with similar Latin letters
How the similarity score works
Each score is calculated by comparing 62 letters and digits (A-Z a-z 0-9) rendered at a 160px cap height on a 32×32 grid with 3px gaussian blur, combined with edge-orientation texture (weighted at 15%).
Scores are normalized on a standardized scale: 100 represents identical letterforms, and 0 represents an average pair among the 1571 fonts compared.