Sitka Font Family Broken on Windows 11 - Microsoft, please provide Sitka 1.12 from Windows 10

Question

Sitka Font Family Broken on Windows 11 - Microsoft, please provide Sitka 1.12 from Windows 10

Pete Matthews Jr 25

Summary: On Windows 11, the repackaged Sitka font family (version 2) does not display the same in a PDF as it does in Word. A DOCX file appears the same in Word under either OS.

Windows 10: DOCX -- Export --> identical PDF
Windows 11: DOCX -- Export --> BROKEN PDF

The Sitka user community needs Microsoft to provide the excellent, professionally-built Sitka font family version 1.12 from Windows 10 on Windows 11.

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The new "variable" Sitka font packaging on Windows 11 is supposed to be more efficient, but it does not produce the same results in a PDF as what is displayed on-screen in Word. It's broken!

In April 2022 I first reported this problem. I worked the problem hard then, but with my 10-day window closing, I had to revert to Windows 10. The bug was still there when I was basically forced to upgrade to Windows 11 in September 2025. I have found two solutions that worked perfectly, but only for a brief period of time. Both attempted to put a copy of Sitka 1.12 from Windows 10 onto Windows 11:

Rename and install the font. This requires disassembling the four files (normal, italic, bold, bold-italic) into six font files each (small, text, subheading, heading, display, banner), using a font editor. Then the each font is edited to change its name. (I chose Aktis (Sitka backwards), in case there were some obscure string-length issue.) Then the font files are reassembled, and the new Aktis font is installed on the system. Then documents must be changed to use Aktis instead of Sitka; styles may be affected. Finally, Export the documents from MS Word to a PDF. This worked for a while. Then every PDF with an Aktis font that I had posted to the web stopped displaying correctly: every character in an Aktis font displayed as a rectangle with four hexadecimal digits inside, one in each corner. Whether the problem is in my construction of the Aktis font, in the free FontForge tool I used, in Microsoft's export of it to a PDF, or a change to Acrobat Reader, its display changed after a couple of months.
Install the Sitka 1.12 font, unchanged, onto Windows 11. Windows may complain that various Sitka fonts are already installed. If asked, say to do it anyhow. In theory, when two copies of a font are installed, the second should be used. Since I had changed my docs for Aktis, I had to change them back. It worked fine on 8 Jan 2026, and for a few days. I shut my computer down and went away for a few days on 11 Jan. While away, I found defects in a document that I had exported and printed that morning. When I got home, I confirmed that the bug was back. Reinstalling Sitka 1.12 made no difference. If looking for the problem, compare carefully - especially headings, bolds, and letter density/footprint - with Word and Acrobat Reader, side by side.

For some people, there is a third choice:

Use a third-party PDF writer with Aktis. I've been using CutePDF writer since before Word did PDF output, and for many purposes it works well. However, my standard PDF is built to display on-screen with 0.2" left and right margins and reduced paper width; printing from Acrobat reader enlarges to fill the sheel - and works very well two-up, too. CutePDF puts small print in the middle of the page, wrecking my plans. It seems likely that CutePDF is doing the best it can, with what Word sends to this apparent printer. I have a revision of my 6x9 (US Trade) size book in the works and don't see how CutePDF can work for uploading to the publisher.

The Sitka user community needs Microsoft to provide a working Sitka font family:

By far the best for people who have been using Sitka for years would be to completely remove the defective Sitka version 2 from Windows 11, and install Sitka 1.12. Even as administrator, I could not remove Sitka, but maybe Microsoft can.
Second best is to rebuild the Sitka 1.12 font family with new names, and provide it to us. It would be great to call it AK or Alaska, so that it appears high on the list of fonts, but "Sitka 1" would be fine.

We all deserve the excellent, professionally-built Sitka font family that was sold to us with Windows 8.5, 9 and 10.

I use Office Home & Student 2021 on Windows 11 Home, but would gladly purchase Office Home & Business 2024, if assured that it would solve my problem. No hint of such assurance has been forthcoming.

References:

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-in/answers/questions/5548022/fidelity-loss-for-sitka-variable-font-when-exporti

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/5492453/has-the-bug-in-windows-11-that-prevents-sitka-font

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/5159631/windows-11-disables-export-of-sitka-fonts

https://3nt.xyz/ideas/Win11FontBugCirc.pdf - kind of a mess, with first yellow and then red updates describing my "fixes" that did not take. Published on 8 Jan, when Sitka was working.

Move from: Windows for home | Windows 11 | Apps

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Pete Matthews Jr 25 Reputation points

2026-01-15T23:28:41.1366667+00:00

Today I signed up for a trial of Microsoft 365. The install was easy, but I did not get the new Word immediately. (File > Account > Switch License fixed that.) Changing to the supported app made no difference to the bug.

I also printed directly to paper from Word, which I seldom do. The bug is there, too - it's not just a PDF problem.

With either app, Word's font list offers the same six fonts as before (small, ...., Banner). It also offers each of those fonts as Semibold. NO, THANKS! They are part of the problem in that somebody probably used semibold to justify the repackaging that BROKE WHAT WE NEED: the Bold and Italic features in Word - and Styles that use them.

Please, please give us a Sitka 1 font. The old Sitka, with its eminent readability and six font sizes, each with its own footprint, is way better than most other fonts. Next up, a Windows 10 system to make my PDFs.
Pete Matthews Jr 25 Reputation points

2026-01-17T04:12:52.2+00:00

My new PDF-producing system is now running. It's a laptop with an Intel Gen 6 CPU from about 2016, too old to be supported for Windows 11. It was just sitting there waiting for me - my wife has been using its replacement. I stripped it down and networked it, mapping drive K: to WORKAREA on my main machine. If I keep my trial of Office 365, I'll install it on the PDF system, but for now, I'm using the Office H&S 2010 that was there already. (I do need to File > Save As > PDF, instead of File > Export > PDF, a tiny nuisance.) [That's about the scale of improvements I remember between Word 2010 and 2021.] All I really need to do is to be sure the docs I want to work on are in WORKAREA and are not open. Then after I open the DOCX and make the PDF, I must remember to close the files on the PDF system. Works like a champ.

Too bad I wasted hundreds of hours on all the other things I tried. If I get around to it, I plan to write all this up and post it on my web site, 3nt.xyz. I'll explain why the Sitka font family is so special. It's way better for me -- and probably many other self-publishers -- than all other fonts I have tested. Also why Sitka 2 may always be inferior to Sitka 1.

Please do put Sitka 1 into Windows!!!!

1 answer

Pete Matthews Jr 25 Reputation points

2026-01-15T23:28:41.1366667+00:00

Today I signed up for a trial of Microsoft 365. The install was easy, but I did not get the new Word immediately. (File > Account > Switch License fixed that.) Changing to the supported app made no difference to the bug.

I also printed directly to paper from Word, which I seldom do. The bug is there, too - it's not just a PDF problem.

With either app, Word's font list offers the same six fonts as before (small, ...., Banner). It also offers each of those fonts as Semibold. NO, THANKS! They are part of the problem in that somebody probably used semibold to justify the repackaging that BROKE WHAT WE NEED: the Bold and Italic features in Word - and Styles that use them.

Please, please give us a Sitka 1 font. The old Sitka, with its eminent readability and six font sizes, each with its own footprint, is way better than most other fonts. Next up, a Windows 10 system to make my PDFs.
Pete Matthews Jr 25 Reputation points

2026-01-17T04:12:52.2+00:00

My new PDF-producing system is now running. It's a laptop with an Intel Gen 6 CPU from about 2016, too old to be supported for Windows 11. It was just sitting there waiting for me - my wife has been using its replacement. I stripped it down and networked it, mapping drive K: to WORKAREA on my main machine. If I keep my trial of Office 365, I'll install it on the PDF system, but for now, I'm using the Office H&S 2010 that was there already. (I do need to File > Save As > PDF, instead of File > Export > PDF, a tiny nuisance.) [That's about the scale of improvements I remember between Word 2010 and 2021.] All I really need to do is to be sure the docs I want to work on are in WORKAREA and are not open. Then after I open the DOCX and make the PDF, I must remember to close the files on the PDF system. Works like a champ.

Too bad I wasted hundreds of hours on all the other things I tried. If I get around to it, I plan to write all this up and post it on my web site, 3nt.xyz. I'll explain why the Sitka font family is so special. It's way better for me -- and probably many other self-publishers -- than all other fonts I have tested. Also why Sitka 2 may always be inferior to Sitka 1.

Please do put Sitka 1 into Windows!!!!

Answer 1

My new PDF-producing system is now running. It's a laptop with an Intel Gen 6 CPU from about 2016, too old to be supported for Windows 11. It was just sitting there waiting for me - my wife has been using its replacement. I stripped it down and networked it, mapping drive K: to WORKAREA on my main machine. If I keep my trial of Office 365, I'll install it on the PDF system, but for now, I'm using the Office H&S 2010 that was there already. (I do need to File > Save As > PDF, instead of File > Export > PDF, a tiny nuisance.) [That's about the scale of improvements I remember between Word 2010 and 2021.] All I really need to do is to be sure the docs I want to work on are in WORKAREA and are not open. Then after I open the DOCX and make the PDF, I must remember to close the files on the PDF system. Works like a champ.

Too bad I wasted hundreds of hours on all the other things I tried. If I get around to it, I plan to write all this up and post it on my web site, 3nt.xyz. I'll explain why the Sitka font family is so special. It's way better for me -- and probably many other self-publishers -- than all other fonts I have tested. Also why Sitka 2 may always be inferior to Sitka 1.

Please do put Sitka 1 into Windows!!!!

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Sitka Font Family Broken on Windows 11 - Microsoft, please provide Sitka 1.12 from Windows 10

1 answer