Chinese, Japanese and Korean to InDesign, without empty boxes
Word quietly borrows a glyph from another font when its font has none. InDesign shows an empty box. So a Word file with Chinese in Times New Roman looks right in Word and fills with boxes in InDesign, unless each character is set in a font that has it.
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The right font for each character
- Han characters are set in the forms of their region: Japanese where the document has kana, otherwise Traditional or Simplified Chinese, by how most of its characters are written. The same code point can be drawn differently in each, so this matters to a reader.
- Noto Sans JP, TC and SC are free, and your font list after the download links to them.
- A character the region's face lacks is set in another region's face rather than left as a box.
- Full-width brackets and commas go with the Han text beside them, so a bracket does not fall back to a Latin font.
What we ran
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Simplified and Traditional Chinese, Cantonese, Japanese and Korean, set as Word files with headings, a table, lists and running heads, and opened in InDesign 2026 on a Mac. Real leaflets from public bodies in Chinese, Japanese and Korean went through the same run. Those are our test files: on your own, check Type > Find Font and the Preflight panel.
The right composer
| Script | Composer | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Chinese | CJK | The way InDesign's own exports set it |
| Japanese | CJK | The way InDesign's own exports set it |
| Korean | World-Ready | Korean is written with spaces, and the CJK composer does not break a Hangul word even at a marked break, so a word wider than its cell hid the cell |
Long Latin runs inside CJK text
An address or a contents line in Latin letters inside a Japanese paragraph is a known trap: the CJK composer treats an invisible break character as glue and handles the run itself, so we leave those characters out of such paragraphs. Without that, a Japanese contents line ran out of its frame.
Limits
- A very rare Han character none of these fonts holds is refused with its name on screen, so you know why.
- A PDF printing Chinese or Korean in a font with no way back to characters keeps that block as a picture, because the alternative was garbage. You can see it and a translator can read it, but it has to be retyped to be edited.
- A Word section or paragraph set vertically is refused for now, with the reason on screen, and the Word files still download. A vertical text box comes through as a frame turned on its side, so its characters lie down instead of standing upright. A turned table cell is fine.
- Vertical text in a PDF needs a look after opening. Check those pages by eye.
What Word files bring with them
| In the Word file | What it would do in InDesign | What we do |
|---|---|---|
| A theme naming MS Mincho for East Asian text | Word links what that font lacks from other fonts. InDesign links nothing | The text goes to its script's Noto face. Before this, Korean and Chinese translations came out as boxes in Myriad Pro |
| A line grid, as in CJK Word templates | Lines would not stand where Word sets them | Each line takes as many grid lines as its type needs, as LibreOffice sets it |
| A variation selector after a Han character | An empty box if left in the Latin font | It goes in the same face as its character, so the variant is drawn |
| A bracket closed on a Latin word, as in （CIRES） | An empty box in Times New Roman | It goes to the document's Han font |
Language tags
InDesign 2025 and 2026 as we run them list no language for Chinese, Japanese or Korean, so this text is tagged [No Language]. Line breaking comes from the composer, not from a dictionary, so it still breaks properly. Do not expect a spell check of it from InDesign.
Checking a page
- Install the fonts in your list before you open the file.
- Open Type > Find Font and check that each region's text has its own face.
- Look at a few characters that differ by region, such as 直 or 骨, if the document's region matters to its reader.
- Open the Preflight panel for overset text. A word in a narrow cell is where to look first.
Questions
Do I need the Japanese edition of InDesign?
We open these files in the versions listed on the main page. The file states its composer.
Can I replace Noto with a font I own?
Yes, with Type > Find Font, once the file is open. Lines may break differently.
Why are the Noto files so big?
A full CJK face is many megabytes because it holds tens of thousands of characters. They are not in our download, so that only matters when you install them.
Try it on a file you would otherwise rebuild
Upload the PDF, the Word file or the scan. Download the copy for InDesign, and the translation too if you ordered one, and open them in your version.
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