Overall, we are very happy with FontBase. The interface is very pleasant and well organized. It is easy to understand, and you can quickly find where everything is. The search, folder structure, and uploading of fonts all work very well and are easy to use. We especially like the option to add the number of available license seats. This helps us manage our fonts and licenses in a clear and organized way.
There are just a few things that could be improved. At the moment, the number of available licenses has to be entered separately for every single font style. For font families with many styles, this can be a little time-consuming, even though it is usually a one-time task. It would be helpful to have an option to set the number of licenses for several or all styles of a font family at once.
An expiration date also has to be entered for every font style. In general, this feature makes sense, but as a publishing company, we often buy font licenses that do not expire. It would therefore be helpful to have an option for licenses without an expiration date. Another option would be to set one expiration date for all styles of a font family at once.
At the moment, we also cannot see which user is currently using a license seat for a font. We work in a team of around ten people, and for many fonts we only have one to five licenses. Being able to see who is currently using a license would therefore be very useful. However, the automatic font deactivation settings may already help with this. We will start using FontBase more actively this month and see whether this becomes an issue in our daily work.
We have also noticed an issue with personal Collections when switching between User and Admin accounts. In our team, we do not have anyone who works only as an Admin. Instead, we selected two people from our department who are responsible for managing the fonts. These two people need Admin access, but at the same time they are also normal users who work with the fonts and create their own personal Collections.
When one of us creates personal Collections as a normal User and then logs in as an Admin to manage fonts, these personal Collections are still visible in the Admin account. It seems that they can then also become visible to other users. Even if another user deletes them, they appear again the next time FontBase is started. For our setup, it would therefore be very helpful to have a clearer separation between personal User Collections and Admin/shared Collections, especially when the same person needs to work both as a normal User and as an Admin.
Overall, we are very happy with FontBase. The clear and intuitive interface makes it very pleasant to use in our daily work. The most important features for us – uploading and organizing fonts, searching for fonts, and managing licenses – work very well. The points mentioned above are mainly small improvements that could make FontBase even more convenient for larger teams.