Is it possible to change the Terminal font?

Bash terminal:

Menu, Edit => Profile Preferences => General tab; uncheck Use the system fixed width font, and select the font you want.

For general xterm terminal, you need to create a file ~/.Xresources, and add settings to it, such as xterm*font: Sublime\ Text\ 2-12 for 12 point (this is a guess, I don't know if it's totally correct).


Though you did not mention what font you are using or what terminal you are referring, I am giving a general answer to change font in gnome-terminal.

I am giving two ways to do this, though both are relatively close to each other

Formal way

  • Open the terminal with pressing Ctrl + Alt + T.
  • Then go from menu EditProfiles. On the profile edit window, click on the Edit button.
  • Then in the General tab, uncheck Use the system fixed width font, and then select your desired font from dropdown menu

Easier way

  • Open the terminal with pressing Ctrl + Alt + T.
  • Right click on the terminal, from the appeared popup menu, go to ProfilesProfile Preferences
  • Then in the General Tab, uncheck Use the system fixed width font, and then select your desired font from dropdown menu.

I am giving two screenshots below:

Image of popup menu

Image of the "Edit" profile window


Ubuntu 18.04 or higher

Now this setting is under

Edit->Preferences-> Unnamed-> Text -> Check Custom font

enter image description here


if you mean a server terminal, that is, no window system, just the console, I like this answer:

setfont /usr/share/consolefonts/UbuntuMono-R-8x16.psf

this is an example; you can see a list of available fonts like this:

ls /usr/share/consolefonts

and should you for some reason not have them, you can install them like this:

sudo apt-get install fonts-ubuntu-font-family-console

note that you may need to put the setfont command in your .profile or .bashrc as it may need to be run upon every login


For Ubuntu 17.04 with GNOME Terminal 3.20.2, the options are a bit different. From the menu, go to Edit -> Profile Preferences -> General tab. In the Text Appearance section, select the Custom font option, click on the selected font, and then reduce the font size number at the bottom of the new window.