diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 1b348a7980779e2e2902c3ff6c16b03fb09d566d..99a8ceba0dce26cd31b4952010233710dd6dee95 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -106,6 +106,8 @@ and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0
   2.38.0 to the behavior Graphviz 2.36.0 and prior had. The difference is most
   apparent when using a non-default `dpi` setting. #2669
 - The Tcl bindings have been updated for compatibility with Tcl 9. #2668
+- The SVG output format (`-Tsvg`, `-Tsvg_inline`) no longer duplicates font
+  families.
 
 ### Fixed
 
diff --git a/plugin/core/gvrender_core_svg.c b/plugin/core/gvrender_core_svg.c
index 1bac43a08d28c08b55b394ac669d0597ffc99612..f20307f26951f095c3f9abc30da632328fe98194 100644
--- a/plugin/core/gvrender_core_svg.c
+++ b/plugin/core/gvrender_core_svg.c
@@ -481,7 +481,7 @@ static void svg_textspan(GVJ_t * job, pointf p, textspan_t * span)
 	stretch = pA->stretch;
 
 	gvprintf(job, " font-family=\"%s", family);
-	if (pA->svg_font_family)
+	if (pA->svg_font_family && pA->svg_font_family != family)
 	    gvprintf(job, ",%s", pA->svg_font_family);
 	gvputc(job, '"');
 	if (weight)
diff --git a/tests/test_regression.py b/tests/test_regression.py
index 685bf135317e8e3b31317063600a2fb3a90862ba..bec38a2d65148646f6678b68a1a1621d0af37ba4 100644
--- a/tests/test_regression.py
+++ b/tests/test_regression.py
@@ -6335,3 +6335,28 @@ def test_lock_graph():
     # now try this with a large integer for the locking operation
     output = run(["gvpr", "-f", program2], input=src)
     assert output == "0\n1\n", "locking a graph using a large integer did not work"
+
+
+def test_duplicate_font_family():
+    """
+    SVG output should not contain duplicate `font-family` items
+    https://gitlab.com/graphviz/graphviz/-/merge_requests/4298
+    """
+
+    # a sample graph to exercise font families
+    source = textwrap.dedent(
+        """\
+    graph G {
+      graph [fontnames=svg];
+      N [label="node" fontname="Helvetica"];
+    }
+    """
+    )
+
+    # convert this to SVG
+    svg = dot("svg", source=source)
+
+    # extract font families
+    for ff in re.findall(r'font-family="(?P<families>[^"]*)', svg):
+        families = [f.strip() for f in ff.split(",")]
+        assert len(families) == len(set(families)), "duplicate font families listed"