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CSS font-language-override Property

The font-language-override CSS property allows to specify the language system of the font. See the values and try examples.

The font-language-override property controls the use of language-specific glyphs. This property can be specified by two values: normal and <string>. The <string> must match a valid BCP 47 language tag. For example, tr for Turkish.

By default, the HTML lang attribute instructs the browser to display glyphs which are designed for a certain language.

The font-language-override property overrides the typeface behavior for a specific language. It's helpful because when a typeface lacks proper language-specific OpenType features (like locl), you can override the default behavior to use glyphs from another language that follow similar typographic rules.

Initial Valuenormal
Applies toAll elements. It also applies to ::first-letter and ::first-line.
InheritedYes.
AnimatableDiscrete.
VersionCSS3
DOM Syntaxobject.style.fontLanguageOverride = "normal";

Syntax

Syntax of CSS font-language-override Property

font-language-override: normal | <string>;

Example of the font-language-override property:

Example of CSS font-language-override Property with normal value

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <title>The title of the document </title>
    <style>
      .example1 {
        font-language-override: normal;
      }
      .example2 {
        font-language-override: "da";
      }
    </style>
  </head>
  <body>
    <h2>Font-language-override property example</h2>
    <p class="example1">Default language setting.</p>
    <p class="example2">Here the font-language-override is set to Danish.</p>
  </body>
</html>

Values

ValueDescription
normalInstructs the browser to use font glyphs that are appropriate for the language specified by the lang attribute. This is the default value of this property.
<string>Instructs the browser to use font glyphs specified by the <string>.

Practice

Practice

What is the purpose of the 'font-language-override' property in CSS?