Add ‘Japanese Supplemental Fonts’ using PowerShell script or command line?

There is ‘Japanese Supplemental Fonts’ in ‘Optional Features’.

Can I add it using PowerShell script or command line, without using the GUI?

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Since you are facing issue in installing optional Japanese language pack, I suggest you to install the language pack by following the below steps and check if it helps.

Step 1:

Press Windows + I keys on the keyboard to open Settings menu.

Click on Time and language in settings window.

Click on Region and language from left navigation pane.

Click on Add a language (+ symbol)

Select Japanese language pack .

Now, click on Japanese language pack and click on Set a default button under the Region and language from left navigation pane.

Step 2:

Press Windows + X keys on the keyboard, select Control panel.

Type Language in the search bar located at the top right corner of Control panel and click on language.

Click on the Japanese language pack on the Language window.

Click on Download and install language pack button under Japanese language pack .

Enter the administrator password if prompted.

Click on Save button.

Refer: Fonts in Windows 10

Refer: Language packs are available for Windows (Applies to Windows 10 Pro).

Download and install additional languages for Windows 10 to view menus, dialog boxes, and other user interface items in your preferred language using the Language Control Panel

Refer: Language packs

Write to us with the status of the issues experienced on the same post for further assistance. Your reply is most important for us to ensure we assist you accordingly.

Installing Japanese Fonts

There are two ways to install Japanese fonts on Windows XP, automatic install and manual install .

Most computers have Japanese fonts as East Asian Languages Pack already prepared on their hard disk, especially Windows XP pre-installed models.
If East Asian Languages Pack is not prepared on the hard disk then you need Windows XP System disk.
Whether the Language Pack is prepared on the hard disk or not depends on your computer’s manufacturer.

East Asian Languages Pack contains Chinese, Japanese and Korean language files.
You can view Japanese, Chinese and Korean after installing this language pack.
It is not possible to install Japanese fonts only.

If you only would like to view Japanese Websites on Web browsers such as IE or Firefox you only need to take this step. Others steps are not necessary.

Here the method is explained with Windows XP English version, but you can install Japanese fonts on Windows XP of other languages using the same method.

A. Automatic installation using Internet Explorer (IE)

When you access to Japanese Website via Internet Explorer (IE) for the first time, a message appears asking «whether or not to install language pack : Japanese».
If you select «Install» at this point Japanese fonts (East Asian Languages Pack) installation automatically begins.

Meanwhile, if you select «Never install any language packs» at this point
«automatic install» will not function from next time.
If you have selected this in the past you need go through manual install.

1.	Access Japanese Website via Internet Explorer (IE).
Click «Install» when the message appears.

2.	If you are using a computer with Japanese fonts ready on the hard disk, installation of Japanese fonts will start.
If your are using a computer without Japanese fonts on the hard disk, a message asking for Windows XP System disk will appear. When this message appears insert System disk to the drive and click «OK».

3.	Installation will take a few minutes.

4.	A message to restart the computer will appear. Click «OK».
(At this point, you can view Japanese websites even without restarting your computer)

B. Manual Installation

If you have accessed Japanese or Chinese Website in the past and selected «Never install any language packs» when the automatic installation message appeared, automatic installation will not function. In this case you need to manually install Japanese fonts.

1.	Open Control Panel from Start menu.

2.	Open «Date, Time, Language, and Regional Options».

3.	Open «Add other languages».

4.	Click «Languages» tab, check «Install files for East Asian languages», and click «Apply».

5.	A message «this will require 230 MB or more of available disk space» will appear. Click «OK».

6.	Restart Windows.

You can now view Japanese Websites on Web browsers such as IE or Firefox.
Other steps are not necessary if you only want to view Japanese Websites.

How to add Japanese fonts on windows 7 ultimate? I just installed Japanese language pack, but it does’t display Japanese fonts on some program which I use.

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Follow these steps and see if it fixes the issue:

b. Type “Region and Language.” Hit “Enter.”

c. Click the “Administrative” tab.

d. Click “Change “System system locale.”

e. Change the “Current System locale:” to “Japanese.”

f. Click “OK”, “Apply” and “OK.”

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If you cannot view the Japanese characters properly in software programs even with the Japanese language pack installed, your software may not support Unicode.

Try making a change to the software by setting to non-Unicode.
Go to Control Panel.
Click on «Clock, Language, and Region». (If you view by Category)
Click on Region and Language. (If you view by Large Icons)
Click on «Change keyboards or other input methods» of «Regional and Language».
Go to Administrative tab.
In the section for Language for non-Unicode programs, click on the Change system locale button.
Click on drop down and select Japanese.
Restart your computer for the changes to be made.

Now try your program again and see if the Japanese characters are now correctly displayed.

Hope this helps.

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Japanese standard web fonts

I am working on a japanese website and have a hard time finding a font which looks good in japanese. I was surprised that so few fonts seem to exist for japanese. My team has contacted several web font providers without much success. Only one company could offer a web font for japanese but it was 35 megabytes which is far to big for the clients to download to their browsers.

For Latin letters there are a few fonts which one can be quite confident almost all users have, like Arial, Verdana, TNR, Georgia and so on. What fonts equal these in japan?

7 Answers 7

Web-font for Japanese, though there are few providers exist, is not really practical as you found the size of the font data is too big to download. Usually Japanese font has 8,000-16,000 glyph so making new fonts means you need to make at least 8,000 glyph, which is pretty heavy task. As a result of it, there are very few variations in Japanese fonts, and Japanese users also care about fonts less than Latin-character users.

Most Japanese websites use default font sets provided on Windows or Mac. The latest ones are Meiryo and Hiragino Kaku Gothic Pro. For older versions such like Windows XP, it is good to add former default fonts MS Gothic(or MS Mincho)/Osaka.

Some old browsers could not understand those font names in English, some others do not recognize the names in Japanese, so it is safe to write both in Japanese and English.

Meiryo and Hiragino’s order is, because Mac users may have Meiryo from MS-Office, and Hiragino is more familiar and matching well on Mac, better by starting Hiragino series.

So the current recommended practice is like this,

Fonts don’t really have to be «web fonts» (woff) to be used on the web. I use several of these on my website:

But here are some free Japanese web-fonts (that I also use):

I am no font/design expert, but just about every Japanese PC should have basic Latin fonts like the ones you mentioned installed, so they will work. But those fonts give a kind of Western look to Japanese characters. If you want to use fonts that Japanese sites typically use I would start by browsing some of the more popular Japanese sites and using things like Firebug or the Chrome developer tools to examine the CSS and see what fonts they reference. For example, yahoo.co.jp currently has this CSS:

The «gothic» typeface fonts seem fairly popular these days: on Windows, fonts like MS Gothic, MS PGothic, etc. Ming typeface is also widely used. These are the default browser font settings for Firefox on my Japanese Windows machine:

The proportional font is the sans-serif font, which is MS PGothic, serif font is MS PMing, and the monospace font is MS Gothic.

BTW, the «Osaka» font was a standard font on Japanese Macs in the 90s. Unless you want that «retro» feel, is highly recommended to use «Hiragino Sans» (not Kaku Gothic that’s deprecated) for macOS and iOS devices for a consistent and modern look and better legibility. Also Hiragino Sans has far more font weights (10) than Kaku Gothic (only 2).