VLW Converter

Extract text from VLW files

Select File
Drop or upload your .VLW file

Online File Converter

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How to extract text from your VLW file

Click the "Select File" button above, and choose your VLW file.
You’ll see a preview, if available.
Click the "Convert file to..." button to extract text information.

Convert VLW to another file type

To convert your VLW file to another format, you need Processing or other Font software.

VLW to TTF
VLW to OTF
VLW to WOFF
VLW to WOFF2
VLW to EOT
VLW to SVG
VLW to BDF
VLW to PCF
VLW to FNT
VLW to FON
VLW to PFM
VLW to AFM

Convert a file to VLW

To convert other file formats to the "Raster Font Texture" file type, you need software like Processing or a similar tool.

UFO to VLW
WOFF to VLW
PFB to VLW
GXF to VLW
AFM to VLW
F3F to VLW
SFD to VLW
WOFF2 to VLW
PSF to VLW
TTF to VLW
TXF to VLW
OTF to VLW

About VLW files

A .VLW file is a specialized Processing Font File used primarily by the Processing creative coding environment and compatible embedded libraries (like Adafruit GFX extensions).

Unlike standard TTF or OTF vector fonts that scale perfectly to any size, a VLW file is a "baked" raster format. It contains a pre-rendered texture atlas (bitmap) of specific characters at a fixed size. This format was designed by the MIT Visual Language Workshop (hence the extension) to optimize rendering performance in Java applets and OpenGL sketches, where calculating vector curves in real-time caused slowdowns.

Common Friction Points:

Pixelation: Because it is a bitmap, scaling a VLW file up makes text look blocky or blurry.
Read-Only: You cannot open a VLW file in Microsoft Word or install it to your Windows/macOS font folder. It acts more like an image than a font.
Creation Only: Users typically do not convert from VLW; they convert standard fonts to VLW using the "Create Font" tool in Processing to ensure their digital art runs smoothly.

For general use, these files should be treated as project assets rather than documents. To "convert" them for viewing, you would typically render the alphabet to a PNG image using a simple code sketch.

Convert.Guru analyzes your VLW file, detects the exact format, and lets you read the text inside.

Users also converted TTF, OTF, CHR, SFP and FSF files.

The VLW Converter Story

The history of Convert.Guru began over 25 years ago in California with Tom Simondi’s file-format database. A former contributor to Space Shuttle development and a software pioneer of the 1980s, Simondi established a trusted resource for file type analysis that was even referenced by Microsoft Windows XP. Today, we use modern technology to process and convert thousands of file formats while continually improving our VLW converter.