Fontduet

Playfair Display + DM Sans

elegantmoderneditorial

Grumpy wizards make toxic brew

A standfirst set in DM Sans, one size up — where a pairing starts earning trust.

The five boxing wizards jump quickly over the lazy dog, mixing jugs of quiet vodka while the jury watches. Click anywhere in this preview and type your own text to try the pairing.

“Type is a beautiful group of letters, not a group of beautiful letters.”

— Matthew Carter

Fig. 1 — Playfair Display over DM Sans, in the wild.

Playfair Display 700 / DM Sans 400 — click any section and type your own copy.

Why it works

Playfair's high-contrast Didone letterforms deliver instant sophistication at display sizes, and DM Sans's low-contrast geometry is the cleanest possible foil — no serifs, no stroke modulation, nothing to compete with the headline's drama. Because DM Sans runs slightly warm for a geometric sans, the pairing avoids the clinical feel Playfair-plus-grotesque combinations can have, landing instead on polished but approachable: perfect for boutique brands and portfolios.

More about each face: Playfair Display · DM Sans

Use this pairing

HTML — Google Fonts embed
<link rel="preconnect" href="https://fonts.googleapis.com">
<link rel="preconnect" href="https://fonts.gstatic.com" crossorigin>
<link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Playfair+Display:wght@700&family=DM+Sans:wght@400;700&display=swap" rel="stylesheet">
CSS
h1, h2, h3 {
  font-family: 'Playfair Display', Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;
  font-weight: 700;
}

body {
  font-family: 'DM Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;
  font-weight: 400;
}
Next.js — next/font
import { Playfair_Display, DM_Sans } from "next/font/google";

const heading = Playfair_Display({
  subsets: ["latin"],
  weight: "700",
  variable: "--font-heading",
});

const body = DM_Sans({
  subsets: ["latin"],
  weight: "400",
  variable: "--font-body",
});
From the same deskKeychord— keyboard shortcuts for every app

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