Samsung has supported custom fonts in its launcher since TouchWiz and One UI's inception. This helped users customise their phones and make them their own, however, Samsung appears to be making a controversial move to strip it away. The brand may kill third-party font support in One UI 8.5, citing a very Samsung reason.
The End of Third-Party Fonts on Galaxy phones?
Spotted first by PiunikaWeb, the r/OneUI subreddit, a user highlighted their frustration over Samsung quietly removing third-party font support. Historically, One UI has offered some of the best font support for Android, letting users switch to different ones without any hassle.
Due to this, many users in the comments of the thread who wanted to update to One UI 8.5 were caught completely off guard. Some of them expressed their inherent disappointment with the update. Although some comments did note that fonts bought via the official Galaxy Store were still usable, third-party providers like zFont have been affected.
Citing security reasons, Samsung recently posted about a moderate patch addressing the "improper verification of cryptographic signature in Font Settings". According to the brand, the font providers could have allowed physical attackers to exploit custom fonts. This move blocks unofficial fonts from being applied.
As for what this means for the users, the ability to change the fonts isn't going away, but Samsung is taking away the options. Users will be left with fonts on the Galaxy Store, but won't be able to install them from the outside. Developers from the zFont app have also confirmed that One UI 8.5 is no longer supported.
For some users who had a custom font applied before the update, the applied font may stick around after the installation reboot. However, attempting to adjust the font settings will force the system back to the default offering.
