In the United States, a typeface, that is, the design of a letter style, the way the letters appear, is not protected by copyright. Hence, a letter style may be designed to look like an exact duplicate of another without infringement. However, a font, that is, the unique underlying software code that allows you to print a particular typeface, is protected. This has long been the position taken by both the US Congress and the US Copyright Office.

The group Georgia Lawyers for the Arts in an online article posted February 10, 2014, explains it this way:

“A typeface is a set of letters, numbers, and punctuation marks whose forms are related by repeating certain design elements that are consistently applied. Put more simply, typeface refers to the way a set of letters or numbers appears… A font, on the other hand, is the computer program that tells the printer or computer display how a letter or character is supposed to be shown. In the United States, fonts are protectable under copyright law. Typefaces, however, are not.”

Similar typefaces may be similar in appearance. Two typefaces may even appear identical. But if they are each based on their own unique digital code, there is no copyright infringement in the US. A copyright infringement occurs when someone, without permission of the original author, copies a font file, which is actually a small software program. A font file is protected as an original work.

Interestingly, the name of a typestyle may be protected as a trademark.