How to Install Microsoft Fonts on Fedora

Installing Microsoft fonts on Fedora provides essential compatibility with documents and web pages that rely on Arial, Times New Roman, Calibri, and other Microsoft TrueType fonts. Fedora does not include these fonts by default due to licensing restrictions, but you can add both the classic Core Fonts collection (Arial, Times New Roman, Verdana) and modern ClearType fonts (Calibri, Cambria, Consolas) used in Office 2007 and later. Once installed, Microsoft Office documents, web pages designed for Windows, and cross-platform applications render text exactly as the original author intended.

This guide walks through installing Microsoft Core Fonts via the community-maintained mscorefonts2 project and modern Microsoft fonts via the archived PowerPoint Viewer. You will verify font availability through terminal commands and the GNOME Fonts application, test font rendering in LibreOffice Writer, and learn how to remove fonts when no longer needed. The Core Fonts installation uses an RPM package with digest verification disabled (required for DNF5), while modern fonts install to your home directory for easy management.

Update System Packages

Before proceeding with the installation, update your Fedora system to minimize potential compatibility issues. Open your terminal by searching for “Terminal” in Activities, then run the following command to refresh repository metadata and upgrade installed packages:

sudo dnf upgrade --refresh

Install Microsoft Fonts via msttcore-fonts-installer

Microsoft does not distribute official RPM packages for these fonts, so this installation uses a community-maintained package from the mscorefonts2 project. The package downloads the original Microsoft font files from SourceForge mirrors and installs them to your system font directories, making them available to all applications.

Microsoft retains the license for these fonts. The installer downloads them from Microsoft’s official redistribution packages hosted on SourceForge mirrors. You may use these fonts to create and view documents (including commercial documents), but you cannot redistribute the font files themselves or embed them in software applications without proper licensing. The installation requires an active internet connection to download approximately 10 MB of font data from SourceForge.

Install Required Dependencies

The font installer requires several tools to download and extract Microsoft’s cabinet archive files. Desktop Fedora Workstation installations typically include these packages by default, while minimal server installations or container environments require manual installation. The dependencies include curl for downloading files, cabextract for extracting Microsoft cabinet archives, xorg-x11-font-utils for X11 font management, and fontconfig for system font configuration.

Install the required packages with DNF:

sudo dnf install curl cabextract xorg-x11-font-utils fontconfig

Fedora Atomic Users (Bazzite, Silverblue, Kinoite): Immutable Fedora variants use rpm-ostree instead of dnf for system packages. Run rpm-ostree install curl cabextract xorg-x11-font-utils fontconfig and reboot your system before proceeding. After the reboot, continue with the font package download and installation steps below.

Download and Install the Font Package

With the dependencies in place, download and install the Microsoft Core Fonts package from the mscorefonts2 project. The msttcore-fonts-installer package includes these Microsoft Core Fonts:

• Andale Mono
• Arial (including Bold, Italic, Bold Italic)
• Comic Sans MS (including Bold)
• Courier New (including Bold, Italic, Bold Italic)
• Georgia (including Bold, Italic, Bold Italic)
• Impact
• Times New Roman (including Bold, Italic, Bold Italic)
• Trebuchet MS (including Bold, Italic, Bold Italic)
• Verdana (including Bold, Italic, Bold Italic)
• Webdings

First, download the font installer package from SourceForge. DNF5 (Fedora 41+) rejects this community package due to missing digest signatures, so you must download it separately and install with rpm directly:

curl -LO https://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/mscorefonts2/rpms/msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm

Next, install the package using rpm with digest verification disabled. The --nodigest and --nofiledigest flags bypass the signature checks that would otherwise cause the installation to fail:

sudo rpm -ivh --nodigest --nofiledigest msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm

The version documented above (2.6-1) was current at publication. To check for newer versions, visit the mscorefonts2 project page on SourceForge and browse the rpms directory. The installation commands remain identical regardless of version number. You can optionally verify package integrity before installation with sha1sum msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm (expected: 0cd8fc72921f917ce27b2e639da6fe25eaa736b4).

Fedora Atomic Users (Bazzite, Silverblue, Kinoite): Immutable systems cannot use standard rpm installation. Instead, install the local RPM with sudo rpm-ostree install ./msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm, then reboot to apply the layered package.

During installation, the package downloads Microsoft Core Fonts from SourceForge mirrors, extracts them to /usr/share/fonts/msttcore/, and registers them with your system font cache. This process takes approximately 30 to 60 seconds depending on your internet connection speed.

Verify Microsoft Fonts Installation on Fedora

Installation Progress Output

During installation, the terminal displays progress messages as the installer downloads individual font packages from SourceForge mirrors (andale32.exe, arialb32.exe, comic32.exe, and others), extracts them to /usr/share/fonts/msttcore/, and rebuilds the font cache. The installation output shows each step of the process:

Preparing...                          ########################################
Updating / installing...
msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1        ########################################
### Using tmp directory /tmp/refresh-msttcore-fonts-1rGlOZ
### Downloading andale32.exe from http://downloads.sourceforge.net/corefonts
### cab file andale32.exe successfully downloaded
### extracting fonts from andale32.exe directly into /usr/share/fonts/msttcore
### Downloading arialb32.exe from http://downloads.sourceforge.net/corefonts
### cab file arialb32.exe successfully downloaded
### extracting fonts from arialb32.exe directly into /usr/share/fonts/msttcore
...
### Indexing the new fonts for Xft
/usr/bin/fc-cache-64: succeeded

The installer downloads ten font packages, extracts TrueType files to the system font directory, and updates the font cache. When you see “/usr/bin/fc-cache-64: succeeded” at the end, the fonts are registered and immediately available to all applications.

Verify Installation via Terminal

After installation completes, confirm the Microsoft fonts are accessible by listing them with the fc-list command. This queries the fontconfig cache and uses grep to filter for common Microsoft font names:

fc-list | grep -iE 'Arial|Times|Verdana|Courier'

You should see multiple matches showing font paths in /usr/share/fonts/msttcore/:

/usr/share/fonts/msttcore/arial.ttf: Arial:style=Regular
/usr/share/fonts/msttcore/arialbd.ttf: Arial:style=Bold
/usr/share/fonts/msttcore/ariali.ttf: Arial:style=Italic
/usr/share/fonts/msttcore/arialbi.ttf: Arial:style=Bold Italic
/usr/share/fonts/msttcore/times.ttf: Times New Roman:style=Regular
/usr/share/fonts/msttcore/timesbd.ttf: Times New Roman:style=Bold
/usr/share/fonts/msttcore/cour.ttf: Courier New:style=Regular
/usr/share/fonts/msttcore/verdana.ttf: Verdana:style=Regular

The output lists each installed font file with its full path and style variant. If you see entries for Arial, Times New Roman, Courier New, and Verdana, the installation completed successfully.

Verify via GNOME Fonts Application

The GNOME Fonts application provides a visual method to confirm Microsoft fonts integrate correctly with your desktop environment. Open it by searching for “Fonts” in Activities and pressing Enter.

Use the search bar within the Fonts application to locate individual Microsoft fonts. Search for “Arial,” “Times New Roman,” or “Verdana” to confirm these core fonts appear in your system’s font library. Each font family should display all its style variants (Regular, Bold, Italic, Bold Italic) separately.

Test Fonts in LibreOffice Writer

To validate real-world application support, test the fonts in LibreOffice Writer. This confirms Microsoft fonts render correctly in productivity applications where document compatibility matters most, such as when opening Word documents or collaborating with Windows users.

1. Search for “LibreOffice Writer” in Activities and open the application.
2. Type a sentence, highlight it, and select a Microsoft font (Arial, Times New Roman, or Verdana) from the font dropdown menu in the toolbar.
3. Verify the text immediately changes to the selected font and that the toolbar displays the font name without substitution warnings.

When LibreOffice correctly displays the Microsoft fonts without fallback substitutions, your system handles imported Microsoft Office documents as intended. Documents that specify Arial, Times New Roman, or other Microsoft fonts will now render with the correct typefaces instead of Linux alternatives like Liberation Sans or Liberation Serif.

Troubleshooting Common Issues

SourceForge Download Failures

If the installer fails during the font download phase, you will see error messages like this in the terminal output:

### Downloading andale32.exe from http://downloads.sourceforge.net/corefonts
Could not download andale32.exe
Failed to download andale32.exe from http://downloads.sourceforge.net/corefonts

This error indicates SourceForge mirrors are temporarily unavailable. First verify your internet connection is active:

ping -c 3 sourceforge.net

If the network is reachable, wait a few minutes and retry the installation with the same rpm -ivh command. The installer automatically tries multiple mirror servers, so transient failures often resolve on retry. If downloads consistently fail after multiple attempts, check the mscorefonts2 SourceForge page for maintenance announcements or mirror status updates.

DNF5 Package Signature Error

If you attempted to install the package with DNF directly, you will encounter this error:

Transaction failed: Rpm transaction failed.
Warning: skipped OpenPGP checks for 1 package from repository: @commandline
  - package msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch does not verify: no digest

This error confirms the package lacks DNF5-compatible digest signatures. Verify you downloaded the package file to your current directory:

ls -lh msttcore-fonts-installer-2.6-1.noarch.rpm

The file should be approximately 29 KB. Then use the rpm installation method with signature verification disabled as documented in the installation section above.

Fonts Not Appearing After Installation

If fonts do not appear in applications after installation, first verify the font files exist in the correct directory:

ls /usr/share/fonts/msttcore/ | grep -E 'arial|times|verdana'

You should see output listing the TrueType font files:

arial.ttf
arialbd.ttf
ariali.ttf
times.ttf
timesbd.ttf
verdana.ttf

If the font files exist but applications do not display them, manually rebuild the font cache:

sudo fc-cache -fv

The command output should include /usr/share/fonts/msttcore in the processed directories and end with /usr/bin/fc-cache-64: succeeded. After rebuilding the cache, restart any open applications (LibreOffice, Firefox, web browsers) to reload their font lists. Most applications only read the system font cache at startup, so changes require an application restart to take effect.

Install Modern Microsoft Fonts (Calibri, Cambria, Consolas)

The msttcore-fonts-installer package installs fonts from the 1990s, but many modern Office documents use newer typefaces like Calibri (the default font since Office 2007), Cambria, and Consolas. These ClearType fonts were bundled with Microsoft’s discontinued PowerPoint Viewer application, which has been archived and remains available for download.

These fonts are extracted from a legitimate Microsoft product archived on Archive.org. While this method is commonly used for personal document compatibility, the fonts remain Microsoft property. For commercial or enterprise use, verify your licensing obligations.

What Fonts Does the PowerPoint Viewer Include?

The PowerPoint Viewer includes the ClearType font collection introduced with Windows Vista and Office 2007:

• Calibri: the default document font in Microsoft Office since 2007
• Cambria: a serif font designed for on-screen reading and headings
• Consolas: a monospace font popular for programming and code
• Candara: a humanist sans-serif font
• Constantia: a serif font with wedge-shaped serifs
• Corbel: a sans-serif font designed for on-screen display

Download and Install the Fonts

The cabextract utility is already installed if you followed the dependency installation steps earlier. If you skipped that section, install it now:

sudo dnf install cabextract

Next, download the PowerPoint Viewer from Archive.org and verify its checksum for integrity. The file is approximately 61 MB and may take a minute to download depending on your connection speed:

cd /tmp
curl -o PowerPointViewer.exe -fsSL "https://archive.org/download/PowerPointViewer_201801/PowerPointViewer.exe"

# Verify the download integrity
EXPECTED="249473568eba7a1e4f95498acba594e0f42e6581add4dead70c1dfb908a09423"
ACTUAL=$(sha256sum PowerPointViewer.exe | cut -d' ' -f1)
if [ "$ACTUAL" = "$EXPECTED" ]; then
    echo "Checksum verified successfully"
else
    echo "ERROR: Checksum mismatch. Expected: $EXPECTED"
    echo "       Actual:   $ACTUAL"
    exit 1
fi

You should see the confirmation message “Checksum verified successfully.” If the checksum fails, delete the downloaded file and try again, as the download may have been corrupted or interrupted.

If the checksum verifies successfully, extract the fonts from the cabinet archive. The cabextract utility handles Microsoft cabinet files and will extract the font files to the current directory:

cabextract -q PowerPointViewer.exe -F ppviewer.cab
cabextract -q ppviewer.cab -F '*.TTF' -F '*.TTC'

You may see a warning about “extra bytes at end of file” during extraction. This is expected and does not affect the font files.

Create a directory for the fonts in your home directory and move them into place. Installing fonts to ~/.local/share/fonts/ makes them available only to your user account, which is appropriate for fonts with licensing restrictions:

mkdir -p ~/.local/share/fonts/microsoft
mv *.TTF *.TTC ~/.local/share/fonts/microsoft/

Update the font cache so applications recognize the newly installed fonts:

fc-cache -f

Verify the installation by checking for Calibri fonts:

fc-list | grep -i calibri

You should see output similar to:

/home/username/.local/share/fonts/microsoft/CALIBRI.TTF: Calibri:style=Regular
/home/username/.local/share/fonts/microsoft/CALIBRIB.TTF: Calibri:style=Bold
/home/username/.local/share/fonts/microsoft/CALIBRII.TTF: Calibri:style=Italic
/home/username/.local/share/fonts/microsoft/CALIBRIZ.TTF: Calibri:style=Bold Italic

Clean up the temporary files to free disk space:

rm -f /tmp/PowerPointViewer.exe /tmp/ppviewer.cab

The modern Microsoft fonts are now available in LibreOffice, Firefox, and all other applications that use the system font directory. Open LibreOffice Writer and search for Calibri or Cambria in the font dropdown menu to confirm they appear alongside your existing fonts.

Remove Microsoft Fonts

The removal process differs depending on which fonts you installed. Follow the appropriate section below based on your installation method.

Remove Core Fonts (msttcore-fonts-installer)

To uninstall the Microsoft Core Fonts package, remove it with DNF. The package’s post-uninstall script automatically deletes the font files from /usr/share/fonts/msttcore/ and rebuilds the font cache:

sudo dnf remove msttcore-fonts-installer

The removal process handles font cache cleanup automatically. However, if you want to ensure all caches update correctly, run a manual cache rebuild:

sudo fc-cache -fv

Verify the Core Fonts are no longer available by querying the font cache:

fc-list | grep -iE 'Arial|Times|Verdana'

If the removal succeeded, this command returns no output. Applications will fall back to alternative fonts like Liberation Sans (Arial substitute) and Liberation Serif (Times New Roman substitute) for documents that previously specified Microsoft typography.

Optionally, remove the dependency packages installed earlier if no other software requires them:

sudo dnf autoremove

This command removes orphaned packages like cabextract and xorg-x11-font-utils if they were installed solely for the font package and are not needed by other software on your system.

Remove Modern Fonts (PowerPoint Viewer)

To remove the modern Microsoft fonts installed from PowerPoint Viewer, delete the font directory and refresh the cache.

The following command permanently deletes all fonts in the ~/.local/share/fonts/microsoft directory. If you have added other fonts to this location, back them up first.

rm -rf ~/.local/share/fonts/microsoft
fc-cache -f

Verify the modern fonts are no longer available:

fc-list | grep -i calibri

The command should return no results, confirming the modern fonts have been removed. Restart any open applications (LibreOffice, Firefox, etc.) to reload their font lists without the Microsoft fonts.

Conclusion

Your Fedora system can now display documents with proper Microsoft font rendering. The msttcore-fonts-installer package provides classic typefaces like Arial and Times New Roman, while the PowerPoint Viewer extraction adds modern fonts like Calibri, Cambria, and Consolas for full compatibility with current Office documents. These fonts integrate with all applications that use the system font directory, including LibreOffice on Fedora, web browsers, and design applications. For working with Microsoft Office files, LibreOffice provides excellent compatibility with Word, Excel, and PowerPoint formats while using either Microsoft fonts or the metrically-compatible Liberation font family included by default.