I finally updated my installation of Calibre the other day and started playing around with the plugin manager under Preferences, and I found out that the Kindle Collections Manager plugin has a secret power: it can let you add a new font to your Kindle without requiring any sort of hack or jailbreak. If you want a different font but don’t want to mess with all the other risks/delights that come with hacking your Kindle, this is a nice clean alternative.
To use it, get the most current version of Calibre, then go into Preferences, scroll down to the green puzzle piece icon, and enable the Collection Manager plugin. The plugin you want is called “Kindle Collections”.
The plugin’s main purpose is, you guessed it, to help you manage your collections on your Kindle (which are a real pain to edit directly on the device). But there’s an extra settings pane where you can do your font replacement magic.
The developer has detailed instructions on this MobileRead Forums thread, but here’s the quick overview.
First, you have to find a compatible font set. Here are the requirements:
- It must be Truetype or OpenType format
- It must have four files, one for each of these variants:
- regular
- bold
- italic
- bold italic
- It must be renamed using this naming convention, where [name] is the font name and “ttf” is the extension (even if it’s an OpenType font):
- [name]-Regular.ttf
- [name]-Bold.ttf
- [name]-Italic.ttf
- [name]-BoldItalic.ttf
The plugin’s dev says Droid Serif is a good example of a compatible font set, if you’re not sure where to start. You can also check out the main Google Web Fonts page, and look for fonts that have a gold “4 variants” label.
Next, do all these things, preferably in the order given:
- Press the Home button on your Kindle, then connect it to your PC.
- Using your computer’s file browser, navigate to the Kindle volume and create a folder on the top level (next to “Documents” for example). Name it “fonts”.
- Copy your four renamed font files into this folder.
- Start Calibre and wait for your Kindle to show up, then select the “Kindle Collections” menu option.
- In the submenu, select “Modify Kindle Settings…”
- In the “Modify Settings” pane, check the “Allow using user font” checkbox and use the drop-down selector to the left of it to choose the font you just added.
- Hit the “Save” button, then eject your Kindle from Calibre. On my computer, I then have to quit Calibre before I can unmount it from OS X, but that may just be a quirk on my end.
- After a few seconds, your Kindle will reboot.
- Open a book, then press the “aA” button to go into font settings. Select the new “alt” option to activate your new font.
Two things to be aware of:
If you can’t open the book, the font you’re trying to use isn’t compatible. Repeat the process above but either select a different new font or select one of the default fonts, then eject and let the Kindle reboot.
If you tire of your new font and go back to your original system font on the Kindle, your new “alt” font will get sad and go away. To get it back you’ll have to repeat the procedure above.
That’s it! Sadly–and most likely because I’m doing it wrong, but I got distracted by the font issue and never went back to try again–my first attempt at actually editing my collections failed. I could see them in Calibre, and I was able to add new titles to one, but after I ejected the Kindle and it restarted, everything remained the same. It could have easily been my fault, though, so I still recommend it.
If you need better and more detailed instructions, or you want to ask the developer for help or give feedback, check out his MobileRead Forums thread. It’s the most official source of info on this plugin, and it looks like he’s still active on it.
By John Hagewood June 30, 2011 - 9:46 PM
This is HUGE, the font thing. I have always had to hack my Kindles (first a K2-US and now a K3-3G). I HATE the standard Kindle fonts, but LOVE everything else about it. When I recently got my K3, I had to jailbreak it, install the font hack, and then DESIGN MY OWN Georgia font. WHAT A PAIN.
So just now I uninstalled the font hack and the jailbreak. then I used my Georgia font as the “alternate” for this plug in. WOW. Now I can show people the default fonts followed by my Georgia font. No jailbreak. VERY SWEET!
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By Cliff Sloane November 4, 2011 - 4:47 AM
So if you go back to the default font ONLY ONCE, it removes the new font?
What if you have more than one, say, you want Droid and Georgia. Will you have two alt choices? Or will the first alt just disappear?
I THINK I only went to landscape rotation and it zapped the new font. I’ll try again, but I suspect that just changing rotation was enough to zap it.
All in all, maybe this is more trouble than it is worth. That is, unless I misunderstand something.
BTW, I really liked the fine-tuning on line spacing that came with the new font.
By Cliff Sloane November 4, 2011 - 5:10 AM
OK, I was wrong about the screen rotation issue. It works just fine.
But on the developer’s page, they do say that only one “alt” font can be displayed at a time.
Can you give me some guidelines on the margins numbers? What number on the Calibre plugin corresponds to Kindle’s “default”? How low can I go before letters get clipped? Is there a lower limit on the plugin’s choices?
By tosti November 10, 2011 - 7:13 PM
Thanks very much! Funcionó bien en mi K3 keyboard.
Gracias.
By Jirayr Beugekian November 26, 2011 - 12:31 AM
I am trying to implement your directions on the Kindle Fire but it seems that there are many differences between the original Kindle and the Fire. Any ideas of how to implement the method you describe on the Kindle Fire?
Tks in advance!
By Chris Walters November 28, 2011 - 12:37 PM
@Jirayr: I’m pretty sure none of the existing hacks for the E-Ink Kindle models will work on the Kindle Fire. You might try poking around Mobile Read’s Kindle Fire forums for up-to-the-minute tips and information: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=243
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By Keis May 14, 2012 - 10:07 PM
Ok, I’m just now getting into the kindles, so I don’t know a whole lot. I have a book where the first letter of the first word at the beginning of each chapter is missing. I thought that maybe I could correct this by adding a different font that has calligraphy so that those missing letters would show up…but it didn’t work. Any suggestions? Has any one else experienced this?