How can I fix "missing Calibri font" errors in Pages?

I'm so darn frustrated! Every time I try to open up a Microsoft Office document in Apple Pages, Apple Keynote or Apple Numbers, I get a warning message about fonts Calibri and Cambria being unavailable. Every time. Yet the documents aren't using the typeface anyway. What gives and, more importantly, how can I fix it so I don't see the $#@$# missing font errors?

Dave's Answer:

You bring up a fundamental compatibility problem with iWorks applications on the Mac versus Microsoft's Office suite on the Mac: while the file format of MS Word, for example, is understood by Mac Pages, there are fonts that are included as part of MS Office that aren't actually part of the default font set on a Mac.

If you've never installed MS Office, you therefore have a problem: there are fonts that might be needed that aren't available. That's the error you're seeing and I'm familiar with it because I too had this same frustrating problem.

I even went into Apple and talked with a "Genius" about it and he had no real solution other than to suggest that I actually install Microsoft Office 2008 on my computer. Yeah, a $100+ solution to a minor annoyance? Not so good.

I then thought that a good solution might be to download the trial edition of Microsoft Office for the Mac, on the assumption that it'd install the fonts as part of the trial, then when I deleted or removed the app, it'd more likely than not leave the new fonts. Still, I didn't really want to have MS Office running on my computer after having spent months teaching myself the iWorks suite after deciding to switch away from Microsoft software on my Mac.

And then I had that "aha!" moment. Let me show you exactly what I figured out...

Caveat: I'm not sure of the exact terms of the Microsoft license for installing demo software, so it's possible that extracting the fonts to install separately might be a violation of terms. If so, I'd appreciate hearing so from someone on the Microsoft team and I'll modify this article appropriately to reflect that. You, as the reader, have been warned. Oh, and a small print reminder too: Ask Dave Taylor exists for purposes of entertainment only. It's not my intention that you actually ever do what I talk about here. We clear?

I'll start by sharing the warning I was seeing with about 75% of the documents I was opening in Numbers:

mac iworks missing calibri cambria font 1

You could ignore this sort of thing, but if you're like me, you want to know what's going on! Click on "Review" and the fateful error appears:

mac iworks missing calibri cambria font 2

Oh, and when I open a Word (.doc) document in Pages? Same darn error:

mac iworks missing calibri cambria font 3

Frustrating as heck!

Here's the solution I came up with, though as I already said, it might not be the one you want to use to solve the problem on your own Mac or IMac system...

On the Microsoft Mac software Web site Mactopia, there's a spot where you can check out all the available downloads. Look closely and you'll see:

mac iworks missing calibri cambria font 4

That's what I want to experiment with so I clicked on the "Download Free Trial" button and after much download time (it's 600MB) the MS Office disk appeared and the Office Installer showed up. I don't want to install it, though. Instead, I right clicked on the icon and chose "Show Package Contents":

mac iworks missing calibri cambria font 5

That's the secret "open the box" Finder option and instead of the icon, it shows everything that's included:

mac iworks missing calibri cambria font 6

I went into the "Packages" folder and now it's a Where's Waldo sort of moment: I had to browse through all the available packages to find "Office2008_en_fonts.pkg":

mac iworks missing calibri cambria font 7

I double clicked on it and found that I could install just the fonts from Microsoft Office 2008 demo edition on my Mac...

mac iworks missing calibri cambria font 8

I went through the necessary steps then ejected the virtual disk, quit the unstarted install process, and that was it. Done.

Further testing demonstrated that the Calibri and Cambria fonts had been installed in the correct place on my MacBook Pro and the problems no longer arise upon opening Microsoft Office documents within iWorks apps. Sweet!

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Categorized: Mac OS X Help (Article 9628, Written by Dave Taylor)
Tagged: apple keynote, apple numbers, apple pages, font problems, iworks, microsoft excel, microsoft office, missing fonts
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Reader Comments To Date: 45

Mike said, on October 5, 2010 5:54 PM:

Amazing! Not often I find such clear, concise, and accurate info on the web...

Big time thanks to you Dave!

ed said, on October 11, 2010 1:49 PM:

Thanks dude - awesome instructions - works like a charm

Chris Cooper said, on October 11, 2010 2:37 PM:

Going to try it out right now. I wonder if after the trial period the font would disappear? Probably not, but I guess I wouldnt be surprised if MS did something like that.

Tom said, on February 18, 2011 2:56 PM:

Thanks Dave. Tried it with MS Office 2011 Mac and it worked great.

KD said, on February 24, 2011 9:02 PM:

Instructions worked to a T. Pages converts word docs with Calibri font without error now. Thanks for the post.

Nick Lee said, on March 4, 2011 5:55 AM:

Just wanted to thank you for your most excellent instructions. I have just done this with the new version and it works. You're a star!

Jill Rust said, on March 12, 2011 3:22 PM:

awesome answer to a perplexing problem! I am a new iMac owner and was transferring over documents and getting that annoying message - I will try this solution - thanks so much for sharing

daveed said, on March 20, 2011 4:50 PM:

Bingo! Yes, it worked for me for Office 11 as well, which is good because I use MSWord at the office and occasionally have to work on stuff at home. (And I refuse to install MS products, having left the PC world altogether.)

I also like that Calibri is now installed in Pages, since I use that for work. It's a clean, readable font for copy decks.

Michael Trench said, on April 8, 2011 3:04 PM:

Worked a treat - thanks Dave.

Jason said, on April 19, 2011 3:22 PM:

You have no idea how much I appreciate this post!!! I'm in school for my doctorate and all my professors and fellow students use office. Of course, the default font is always the &*$%^ calibri! Every hour, every day, all the time, I get that stupid error. No more! Thank you so much!

mj said, on June 26, 2011 1:09 PM:

please help!

i have followed your intructions, dowloaded the fonts package in isolation, quite the rest of the installer but cannot get the fonts package to open i fontbook.

what have i done wrong??

BW MJ

Ken said, on July 10, 2011 8:42 AM:

Thank you, Dave. This has solved a lot of problems for me as well.

PTarsus said, on July 26, 2011 1:19 PM:

Stellar instructions; timely help. Thanks for the assist, Dave. You've done a wonderful service for the non-MS world.

DeDe said, on August 6, 2011 5:24 PM:

Outstanding instructions! Thank you so much! :)

Sam Prefect said, on August 9, 2011 11:00 PM:

Brilliant. I have been quietly, though constantly, annoyed at that Would you like to review message. This worked exactly like you said. Thank you so much!

Sierra Amber said, on August 13, 2011 11:18 AM:

Sounds so simple and I did everything, installed office2011_en_fonts_fontcollection.pkg, said it installed successfully but it didn't work. Tried restarting it but still nothing. I was so happy to find this but now I'm totally bummed. Does anyone have any ideas? I'd sure appreciate them. Thanks in advance and thanks for this suggestion.

Sierra said, on August 13, 2011 1:13 PM:

Tried it again downloading the office2011_all_fonts.pkg and it worked!!! yay!

Peter said, on August 27, 2011 7:41 AM:

Cool. Although on Aug 27, 2011, the provided download link is not correct, it takes you to some MS Office updates files. Instead try: https://www.microsoft.com/mac/trial, enter name and e-mail address, and download. It's a 900MB download, so it's going to take 10-30 minutes depending on your speed.

Stephan said, on September 3, 2011 1:48 PM:

I'm a Mac newbie and, like probably everybody else, have been totally driven crazy by those annoying popups whenever I opened Windows documents with Pages or Numbers. Although the download links didn't work like expected, the relinks actually do as well and the workaround is still valid. Even with the current Office 2011 installer. I can't thank you enough, Dave, for enhancing my user experience with my Mac significantly. You rock! Regards from Germany.

Jessica said, on September 21, 2011 9:08 PM:

OMFG, thank you.

Caleb said, on September 28, 2011 9:21 AM:

Can I delete the rest of the software suite after I install the fonts package? <<<<Newb

Dave Taylor said, on September 28, 2011 9:39 AM:

Caleb, yes, you should be able to do that safely. If not, just install it again. :-)

DY said, on October 1, 2011 10:22 PM:

You are a genious! Such a simple fix! Thank you for figuring this out for us! Now why can't apple fix this with an update? EVERYONE must have this problem. Thanks again!

Peter said, on October 17, 2011 10:35 AM:

If you prefer to download only a 45MB file (rather than 900MB), you can use the "Open XML File Format Converter for Mac 1.2.1" at

http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads?pid=Mactopia_AddTools&fid=9796588D-238F-4694-9598-1AA8D2BECB55#viewer

Installation process is somewhat different: look for the font package ("OpenXML_all_fonts.pkg")inside folder "Packages". Inside the folder "Contents" you'll find file "Archive.pax.gz". Double click on that. It will download a folder "Archive" into your downloads folder. Look inside that folder Archives and you'll find all the MS fonts.

Now just drag them all into your Fonts folder within the Library, which you'll find by clicking on "Go" in the Finder menu, then clicking on "Computer" and then on your Macintosh HD. Done...

Dennis said, on November 5, 2011 2:58 AM:

Many thanks for that clear and precise workaround, I am new to Mac and was beginning to despair, Your solution is perfect.

matt said, on December 7, 2011 11:30 PM:

wow i was very skeptical on this. THUMBS UP!!

Fred Avolio said, on December 11, 2011 10:21 PM:

Brilliant. Thank you.

Andrew said, on December 15, 2011 12:54 AM:

I followed all your instructions on "Fixing Calibri Font" Erros in Pages and it did not work? I still have the same problem each time I open a Word doc. in Pagas. I still have the following in the "Warning" menu-Bwgrk, Bwhebb, Bwgrki and Text frames as all missing. So what do I do to stop this from showing again and again.

Robert Godfrey said, on February 1, 2012 2:29 PM:

Bad news: Microsoft's Software License Agreement that comes with Open XML File Format Converter for Mac states...

"By using the software, you accept these terms. If you do not accept them, do not use the software.

"2. FONT COMPONENTS. While the Office for Mac software is running, you may use its fonts to display and print content. You may only
"• embed fonts in content as permitted by the embedding restrictions in the fonts; and
"• temporarily download them to a printer or other output device to help print content."

Therefore, using the fonts without running Office for Mac appears to be a violation of Microsoft's software license agreement.

MacFan said, on February 27, 2012 12:16 PM:

Great job. Like you I do everything I can to keep Microsoft off of my Mac, I even hate that I have to have Silverlight just to use Netflix. Your workaround worked perfect.

James said, on March 13, 2012 3:53 AM:

Brilliant, thanks for these clear instructions - they've just made my day a whole lot easier!

Ives said, on April 17, 2012 10:48 PM:

Thank you very much! :)

Anthony Bramante said, on April 19, 2012 4:40 PM:

Still works great with Office 2011 for Mac. Thank you!

Kkthekat said, on May 23, 2012 10:36 AM:

"Import Warning: The font "Calibri" couldn't be converted for use by Microsoft Office.
"Import Warning: The font "Calibri Bold" couldn't be converted for use by Microsoft Office."

??????

This was after I installed the fonts from the 2011 Free trial and attempted to open a powerpoint file in Keynote

Chuck said, on June 12, 2012 3:41 AM:

WOW, Thanks! I ran into this problem over a year ago but gave up trying to get it to work at the time. My problem is exacebated by the fact I have to mod excel spreadsheets in the Japanese Excel! iWork Numbers is fully bilingual (multi-lingual) but MS Office for Mac is unilingual and I can't read Japanese menus!. Now that I can reliably read AND write Excel spreadsheets, I can do my work in Numbers and have confidence that the fonts will not change. Thanks so much for this information.

Ali-B said, on June 30, 2012 4:38 AM:

You sir are a legend :-) Thank you!

Tim said, on July 2, 2012 4:46 AM:

Thanks Dave. Worked like a charm. That one was driven' me NUTS!

Douglas Alencar said, on July 13, 2012 6:20 PM:

This way is much easier! It's a much smaller download, too!

http://www.labnol.org/software/tutorials/free-download-calibri-font-on-mac/3684/

Sean C said, on July 18, 2012 2:41 PM:

Flat out perfect! I recently removed MS Office 2011 from my Mac, and following their instructions didn't realize the headache I would have after removing the fonts. This worked great and best of all you don't have to add everything back in.

Be sure to install the "office2011_all_fonts.pkg" file though. There is another file that says fonts in there but it is only 54k, the office2011_all_fonts.pkg is 175+ mb (and actually installs @ 300+ so that is the one you want.

Kat said, on August 18, 2012 12:45 PM:

This worked so well. I've been trying to figure this out for months. Like Sean C. above, I installed the office2011_all_fonts and it worked like a charm. Thank you for the concise and accurate instructions.

Cat said, on August 28, 2012 7:21 PM:

Thank you. This is a terrific help and great advice.

Lotte said, on October 26, 2012 8:04 AM:

Perfect!! Thanks!!! :D Now I don't have to write my master thesis in Times New Roman! :D

dev said, on January 2, 2013 6:23 AM:

i dont know why, but when i right click the icon, im not receiving the option of 'show package contents' it
it goes from 'open with'
to 'get info'
without 'show package contents' in between.
WHY?? AND HELP (please)

Joel said, on January 2, 2013 9:58 PM:

THANK YOU, Dave Taylor! I followed your instructions (just for entertainment purposes, of course), except I downloaded the much smaller "Open XML File Format Converter for Mac 1.2.1" per Peter's October 17, 2011 suggestion, and it worked! Calibri and Cambria were installed correctly!

And dev, maybe you did the same thing I did. I right-clicked (Conrtol-clicked) on the downloaded .dmg file and there was no "show package contents". I finally discovered you need to click on the .dmg file to actually start the installation and then right-click (Conrtol-click) on the icon in the installation window. For the XML File Format Converter the icon is labeled "Open XML File Format Converter for Mac 1.2.1.mpkg". I hope that helps.

nick said, on March 26, 2013 11:24 AM:

Any fonts not microsoft which are not in your fontbook can be easily found in sites such as fonts 2 u for free.

I do have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but first I'd like to say thank you, Dave, for all your helpful information by buying you a cup of coffee!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!

How can I fix "missing Calibri font" errors in Pages?

Reader Comments To Date: 45

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!

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