40
votes
What's your go-to mono font?
Let's share our favourite mono fonts and maybe we can find some new favourites. I used to use whatever was inbuilt with Visual Studio and JetBrains' IDEs, but since JetBrains released their JetBrains Mono, I've started using it everywhere. I override the monospace font on every website with it. Never was a huge fan of Fira Code, Consolas, or the other popular ones. Personal taste. But somethings about JB Mono just speaks to me!
Are you a ligatures person? Personally, I love them :)
Iosevka. It also has non-monospaced variants, so I use it as the default UI don't on my desktop environment.
I use Iosevka most of the time and switch to jetbrains mono when I need the font size to be tiny - jbm is more readable at small sizes
I second this. Kinda the same, it's Iosevka for me. I use the default version but with Bulgarian locale, if I need CJK then I add Sarasa Gothic. I use the font in IDE, console and as default mono-font everywhere.
Edit-Add:
It's depend on situation, my mood etc: somtimes yes, sometimes no. But usually no.
I Asdo use Iosevka. Because of it now I tend to stay away from non-narrow fonts, as I like the text to fit in its line.
I have make my own builds in arch, with hand-picked shapes, using this package definition https://gitlab.com/unduthegun/ttf-iosevka-custom
I probably should update it to the latest version, but it's been years that the font has been stable and only languages I don't use have been evolving
I love the look of dejaVu sans mono
I too enjoy DejaVu Sans Mono. I've noticed MacOS uses Menlo as a default monospace font, which is nearly the same as DejaVu Sans Mono (they're both derived from Bitstream Vera). I actually prefer DejaVu Sans Mono though, as I think the hyphens (
-) are more clearly separated when you've got more than one in a row. Also, DejaVu fonts have such a permissive license that I can use them wherever I want to, so that's a huge bonus.A lot of folks seem to enjoy JetBrains Mono, but I find the fancy ligatures alarming. I don't want my
!=sequence merging into some sort of spooky≠creature.JetBrains Mono is distributed with a non-ligature version named "JetBrains Mono NL". It's in the official zip download and gets installed alongside the ligature variant. This is what I use for my monospace needs.
Source Code Pro is my go to.
A few years ago I went through just about every monospace font I could find for use in coding, and I found I kept going back to Source Code Pro. Still my favorite.
I did a similar thing looking at fonts and color schemes. It took a few evenings, but I've been quite happy with my setup since then. (I landed on Space Grey Eighties as my color scheme)
I also find it very readable. Source Code Pro and Monaco are both extremely well designed fonts. They're easy to scan and they look great in various font sizes.
Oh, I tried a lot over the years. Being on a 1080p screen still, Microsoft's
Cascadia Codeis neat but also looks a bit blurry as doesn't seem very optimized for ClearType on lower resolutions.So I've tried, among many others:
Jetbrains Mono: Too tall for my liking.Consolas: Lacks ligatures and I got used to them.Fira: Too thin and also doesn't seem to work well with ClearType again.Intel One: As cool as the reasoning for the brackets and braces are, they're just too weird for my brain.Ultimately, I decided that if it had ligatures,
Consolaswould have been perfect. So I used Consolig to create my own copy with ligatures, and have been using that ever since.I think should I swap to a 1440p+ screen for work, I'd simply go with
Cascadia Codehowever. It looks amazing apart from the bad aliasing.I use the Terminus font. I found it a long time ago and it's what I default to for my terminal.
Same! I love the pixel-perfect bitmap look.
I adore Hack; specifically I use this patched version from Nerd Fonts which adds Powerline symbols and all kinds of fun icons.
No joke, I love Comic Mono. Been using it for years. It’s great that while it’s fully mono and legible, it also has some (no pun intended) character.
I have my VS Code set to use this.
I usually go for Monaco, but maybe I’ll give JetBrains Mono a try. I mostly work in R, so I’ll have to see how to install a custom font. My time with Java is in JetBrains anyway so that’s nice and easy.
Ubuntu Mono. There's just something that feels right about it to me. I sometimes use bitmap fonts (namely Terminus and Cozette) if I'm in the mood, but I always come back to Ubuntu Mono eventually.
Been using fantasque sans mono for a number of years now. I like the wibbly wobbly look. I use tmux/vim all day and it plays very nice there.
Re: ligatures, Matthew Butterick makes a convincing (in my opinion) case against them.
His argument boils down to their ambiguity w.r.t. Unicode and lack of semantic awareness.
Long ago I fell in love with scientifica, but it is bitmap and ends up being way too small on all of my monitors. I usually go with Consolas as I otherwise don't have a big preference.
This font might just be the magic one for me personally. I work in a music tracker DAW and I'm constantly on the lookout for a good mono-retro one.
I used Roboto Mono for a long time, until JetBrains released their font, like you said. Now I'm ride or die for JetBrains Mono.
I recently discovered Envy Code R, which works for me well enough because I vehemently despise monospace with serifs...
I've been using Dank Mono for several years now. Its semi-cursive italic variant helps certain bits of syntax really pop and I find its ligatures nice.
This one is mine too. I use the ligature version with the nice italics and it makes me unreasonable happy.
I use Cousine. I like high x-height fonts.
A helpful coding font picker: https://www.codingfont.com/
I'm neutral on ligatures. Don't mind having them, don't mind not.
Came here to shout out Coding Font! For anybody who tries it, I recommend turning on the "Hide Font Names" option, which allows you do a blinded comparison between the fonts. Coding Font pointed me towards Source Code Pro (linked in other comments here), which is my current mono font.
That is such a fun idea for a website! Thanks for sharing. Would love for it to have some more font options though, there are so many more (as seen in this thread)
I love Berkeley Mono, even though it cost me 75$. I think regularly about how much I like that font.
I was wondering how they offer an eval. I really like their enforcement method:
I can't get past Liberation. All other fonts look like fonts. Liberation just gets out of the way, if that makes sense.
I use a somewhat hacked-up version of ProFont, at a rather miniscule font size (9px). I like ProFont because it's not terribly tall, and remains very readable at such a small font size, which helps me pack a rather absurd amount of information onto even a laptop screen.
Mainly use IBM Plex Mono, alongside the rest of the IBM Plex font family. It's a good improvement of some of the classic Selectric typefaces, from many of which modern fonts take significant inspiration.
I'm a fan of Inconsolata, undoubtedly in part because it's the typeface used throughout the excellent game Kentucky Route Zero.
Inconsolata is what I always write code in now. I specifically prefer this "dz" version: Website for Incosolata-dz
Thanks for this! I've used Inconsolata for years but think I'll prefer this tweak as well.
Uncommon opinion: I like my mono fonts to be a similar to a standard non mono font as possible. With that, my go to free font is Go Mono
Linux user; I can't seem to get used to anything other than Inconsolata.
I really like Sligoil. Mononoki and Input are other favorites.
Someone recommended Adobe's Source Code Pro and I haven't found one with it's level of sleekness. I use it everywhere I need mono fonts.
(Before I was using Droid Sans Mono.)
I like Operator Mono (here's a patched one) --- it feels balanced. I also really like Splines Sans Mono for my spreadsheets.
Did you like typefaces before they were cool? Try out Fixedsys Excelsior!
Definitely Lucida Console
I'm currently using Cascadia Code in (Windows) Terminal and VSCode, Input in Game Maker Studio and Roboto Mono for referencing monospace fonts in prose.
I find ligatures distracting for code so I never went for ligature-heavy fonts like Fira. I remember using the IBM Plex font for something too (they have a great looking website).
For anything that I need to send to other people (whether digitally or printed), I use Consolas. It's a decent standard built-in font, but it's not really great for anything other than that purpose.
I'm currently using FiraCode for my own personal use, I enjoy the look and feel of it, and have come to like the ligatures as well (used ligature-less Jetbrains Mono previously, not going back).
I've used Liberation Mono for years and still prefer it for most things. I try every monospaced font I come across to see if any can dethrone it, but usually its a wash or I la tout don't like them. I am definitely going to check out this thread and do some test driving today though.
I've always liked roboto, so when i learned there was a mono version I used that, and have been for a while.
dejavu sans mono is also good.
I love mononoki. I don't think it has ligatures, but I really do not like those. For me, i find that they make code less readable.
Fira code here. It isn't bad, but i am open to changing if someone has a nicer looking option.