Okay guys i need a font for my desktop app.
> has to be sans-serif
> has to render good on Windows, MacOS and Ubuntu
> has to be adapted for 10px to 12px thin to bold text
> has to be free for commercial use
I don't want an extravagant font. I don't want a font that is slightly blurry on smaller sizes. I want a highly readable, pleasing to the eye, modern font. Something that fits perfectly in UIs with a lot of content.
Also avoid old fonts with strong biases and associations in consumer minds like arial, helvetica and open sans.
Why not use the system's default sans-serif font?
Because i am building a custom design system. I want to guarantee a consistent UI.
Open Sans
Only non-straight non-men waste time thinking about a font other than the system default.
But if you fail my qualifiers, this is pretty comfy:
Only autistic programmers who are bad at anything but code don't understand the value of a good font family and icon kit when building a user interface. That's why UI based Open Source projects don't take off. That's why most programmers aren't good product designers. The details matter.
Desktop apps that use non-system fonts look cringey and flow poorly with the design language of the system.
>Desktop apps that use non-system fonts look cringey and flow poorly with the design language of the system.
It's the opposite. Desktop and Mobile applications that stick to native components (native font, native icons, native controls and UI kits) look cheap, interchangeable and like scams. Steam, Discord, Obsidian, and almost all apps with a moderately elaborate UI come with a custom design system.
Picrel does not use system fonts and while there are tons of things to criticize about Discord, its fonts looking weird isn't on the list of issues.
This shit is the new Arial. It's used everywhere. It's a very polyvalent font but it would kill my app in terms of differenciation and branding. I might as well use Arial or Helvetica.
Roboto?
https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Roboto
I'm not a big fan of Roboto. I don't think it looks as good as other Sans Serif fonts on User Interfaces and data-centric Dashboards.
Noto Sans
Checked. They both look very readable in smaller text sizes.
if you want to try something new, ubuntu for headings and source code pro for content
yes, that has been done professionally before
These are amazing fonts taken out of context but in the context of a User Interface with a lot of controls, Admin dashboards, tables and messages, i don't think source code pro and Ubuntu (which i like a lot) would be adequate.
Lato.
inter is nice and made for user interfaces
just be aware that any font you pick will look out of place compared to other applications due to them using system fonts
Most modern applications (including your Electron apps) don't use system fonts.
electron apps don't look bad but they don't integrate well with the surrounding environment
it doesn't matter that much but nobody is launching discord with the belief that it complies with the ui guidelines microsoft and apple use for their operating systems
The System toolkits shouldn't be used for serious apps and it isn't anymore. Any application with a minimum of backing and investment comes with it's custom design system.
Just think of the mobile apps that use the default material design on android VS the ones with custom icons and controls. The same can be said about Desktop applications. I can't think of a single desktop app with a great UI that sticks to the native components.
personally i think the default macos apps have great user interfaces while using native components
Yes, mac is the exception. But even then, unless your shipping for macos only it's better to leave the native components for the system apps. If you're building a big project or if your program will be one among many in a suite of programs, or (again), if your application has a web client as well, you should preferably define your own design system.
>The System toolkits shouldn't be used for serious apps and it isn't anymore.
Pretty all of the serious professional engineering tools I've seen use native toolkits, and even for those don't all of them use system fonts. Non-native toolkits and fonts are for consoomers because they know different UI gives them "branding" so it's easier to market to the mass.
>professional engineering tools
Now i see where your assumption comes from. Yes, if you're building engineering tools the only things that really matters is usability. I am not building a tool for engineers. I am building a tool for Businesses that will be used by Jordie and Stacey.
fira code
Ubuntu for UI
MonoLisa for monospace
>has to render good on Windows
impossible