Windows 11 is pretty fancy compared to Windows 10, but what if you decide you don’t like the font or just want something different? This is how you can use the registry to change the Windows 11 system font.
How to create a REG file to change the default system font
Warning: Be careful when editing the registry. Removing keys or changing values carelessly can break Windows 11. If you carefully follow our instructions, you should be fine.
Windows 11 doesn’t support changing the default system font through any of the usual means: you can’t do it in the Fonts window, there’s nothing in Ease of Access features, and there’s not even a legacy option in Control Panel. That means we will have to modify the Windows Registry.
Find or install the font you want
The first thing you need to do is identify which font you want. You can see the fonts that are already installed on your PC by going to the Fonts window.
Click the Start button, type “font settings” in the search bar, and then click “Font Settings”. Alternatively, you can open the Settings app and navigate to Personalization > Fonts
Scroll through the installed fonts and see if anything appeals to you. If none of them do, don’t worry, you can always install more fonts.
RELATED: How to install (and uninstall) fonts in Windows 11
We need to get the correct name of the font we want to use first. Scroll down the font window until you find it, then write down the name. Let’s say, for example, that we want to use the most controversial font in the world: Comic Sans. The proper noun is “Comic Sans MS” in our example.
Create the REG file
You can modify the registry directly using Registry Editor (Regedit), or you can write a predefined registry file (REG file) that will automatically apply certain changes when you double-click it. Since this particular registry hack requires many lines to be changed, it is more efficient to simply write a REG file than to go through the registry manually.
You will need a plain text editor for this step. Notepad will work fine if you don’t have a specific program you want to use.
Open Notepad, then paste the following text into the window:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Fonts] "Segoe UI (TrueType)"="" "Segoe UI Bold (TrueType)"="" "Segoe UI Bold Italic (TrueType)"="" "Segoe UI Italic (TrueType)"="" "Segoe UI Light (TrueType)"="" "Segoe UI Semibold (TrueType)"="" "Segoe UI Symbol (TrueType)"="" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\FontSubstitutes] "Segoe UI"="NEW-FONT"
Change “NEW-FONT” to the proper name of the font you want. This is what it looks like for our Comic Sans example:
Once you’ve successfully completed it, go to the top left and click File > Save As. Name the file whatever you like (ideally something logical), then put “.reg” at the end. It is absolutely essential that you use the “.reg” file extension; otherwise it won’t work. Click “Save” and you’re done.
Use REG file to change system default font
All you need to do now is double click on the REG file you created. A warning pop-up will appear that using untrusted REG file may harm your computer.
You can trust this REG file since we wrote it and you’ve seen everything it does. In general, you shouldn’t trust random REG files you find on the Internet without checking them out first. Go ahead and click “Yes”, then reboot your PC. When it finishes rebooting, it will be using a new default system font.
Change system default font back to Segoe
Of course, you won’t be permanently stuck with the new font once you change it. You can easily change it back at any time. You need to create another REG file just like we did before, except you’ll use different code. Copy and paste the following into your second REG file:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Fonts] "Segoe UI (TrueType)"="segoeui.ttf" "Segoe UI Black (TrueType)"="seguibl.ttf" "Segoe UI Black Italic (TrueType)"="seguibli.ttf" "Segoe UI Bold (TrueType)"="segoeuib.ttf" "Segoe UI Bold Italic (TrueType)"="segoeuiz.ttf" "Segoe UI Emoji (TrueType)"="seguiemj.ttf" "Segoe UI Historic (TrueType)"="seguihis.ttf" "Segoe UI Italic (TrueType)"="segoeuii.ttf" "Segoe UI Light (TrueType)"="segoeuil.ttf" "Segoe UI Light Italic (TrueType)"="seguili.ttf" "Segoe UI Semibold (TrueType)"="seguisb.ttf" "Segoe UI Semibold Italic (TrueType)"="seguisbi.ttf" "Segoe UI Semilight (TrueType)"="segoeuisl.ttf" "Segoe UI Semilight Italic (TrueType)"="seguisli.ttf" "Segoe UI Symbol (TrueType)"="seguisym.ttf" "Segoe MDL2 Assets (TrueType)"="segmdl2.ttf" "Segoe Print (TrueType)"="segoepr.ttf" "Segoe Print Bold (TrueType)"="segoeprb.ttf" "Segoe Script (TrueType)"="segoesc.ttf" "Segoe Script Bold (TrueType)"="segoescb.ttf" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\FontSubstitutes]
"Segoe UI"=-
Then save it, just like we did before. Run the REG file, click “Yes” on the warning, and then restart your PC. Your system font will return to normal.
The REG file to restore the system font to the default font will always be the same, regardless of the font you have previously selected. Since it’s always the same, we’ve included it here, in case you don’t want to make another one yourself.
RestoreDefaultSystemFont.zip
