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How sure can you be that the font you specify will be present on the end user's machine? This is the latest snapshot of the Code Style Mac font survey and should give you greater confidence in selecting a font.

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The most common Mac fonts

The most common font for Mac systems is the classic sans serif font Helvetica at 100% frequency. This is followed by the sans serif font Lucida Grande, monospace font Monaco and sans serif font Geneva. The classic typewriter font Courier completes the 5 most common Mac fonts at 99% frequency.

The new Web safe fonts

Sans serif fonts Helvetica Neue, Gill Sans and Futura, heavy sans serif Arial Rounded MT Bold, monospace font Andale Mono and cursive font Apple Chancery are reported with greater frequency on Mac systems than Microsoft Web safe fonts Courier New and much maligned Comic Sans MS.

Most common fonts on Mac systems to 6 March 2010
Font name Installed (%) Sample Image
Helvetica 100.00% 100.00% Sample Image
Lucida Grande 99.71% 99.71% Sample Image
Monaco 99.43% 99.43% Sample Image
Geneva 99.14% 99.14% Sample Image
Courier 98.85% 98.85% Sample Image
Arial 97.41% 97.41% Sample Image
Times 97.13% 97.13% Sample Image
Verdana 97.13% 97.13% Sample Image
Helvetica Neue 95.11% 95.11% Sample Image
Georgia 94.83% 94.83% Sample Image
Trebuchet MS 94.54% 94.54% Sample Image
Times New Roman 94.25% 94.25% Sample Image
Arial Black 93.97% 93.97% Sample Image
Gill Sans 92.24% 92.24% Sample Image
Courier New 91.67% 91.67% Sample Image
Impact 91.09% 91.09% Sample Image
Futura 90.80% 90.80% Sample Image
Arial Rounded MT Bold 90.52% 90.52% Sample Image
Andale Mono 90.23% 90.23% Sample Image
Apple Chancery 90.23% 90.23% Sample Image
Arial Narrow 89.94% 89.94% Sample Image
Comic Sans MS 89.94% 89.94% Sample Image
Optima 89.66% 89.66% Sample Image
Skia 89.66% 89.66% Sample Image
Copperplate 88.79% 88.79% Sample Image
American Typewriter 88.51% 88.51% Sample Image
Baskerville 88.51% 88.51% Sample Image
Hoefler Text 88.51% 88.51% Sample Image
Zapfino 87.93% 87.93% Sample Image
Didot 87.64% 87.64% Sample Image
Papyrus 87.16% 87.16% Sample Image
Marker Felt 87.07% 87.07% Sample Image
Brush Script MT 85.92% 85.92% Sample Image
Big Caslon 85.32% 85.32% Sample Image
Herculanum 84.10% 84.10% Sample Image
Palatino 79.89% 79.89% Sample Image
Tahoma 77.87% 77.87% Sample Image
Lucida Bright 67.58% 67.58% Sample  
Lucida Sans 67.58% 67.58% Sample  
Lucida Sans Typewriter 67.58% 67.58% Sample  
Casual 49.54% 49.54% Sample  
Capitals 42.51% 42.51% Sample Image
Century Gothic 39.14% 39.14% Sample Image
Lucida Handwriting 31.50% 31.50% Sample Image
Copperplate Gothic Bold 30.28% 30.28% Sample Image
Century Schoolbook 25.38% 25.38% Sample  
Garamond 25.08% 25.08% Sample  
Bookman Old Style 23.85% 23.85% Sample  
Book Antiqua 22.94% 22.94% Sample  
Monotype Corsiva 22.94% 22.94% Sample  
Goudy Old Style 21.41% 21.41% Sample  
Haettenschweiler 21.41% 21.41% Sample  
Britannic Bold 20.80% 20.80% Sample  
Footlight MT Light 20.80% 20.80% Sample  
Colonna MT 20.49% 20.49% Sample  
News Gothic MT 20.49% 20.49% Sample  
Playbill 20.49% 20.49% Sample  
Braggadocio 20.18% 20.18% Sample  
Desdemona 20.18% 20.18% Sample  
Calisto MT 19.88% 19.88% Sample  
Matura MT Script Capitals 19.88% 19.88% Sample  
Wide Latin 19.88% 19.88% Sample  
Abadi MT Condensed Light 19.57% 19.57% Sample  
Kino MT 18.96% 18.96% Sample  
Chicago 17.24% 17.24% Sample Image
Charcoal 16.95% 16.95% Sample Image
Bitstream Vera Sans Mono 15.29% 15.29% Sample  
Gadget 15.23% 15.23% Sample Image
Bitstream Vera Serif 14.68% 14.68% Sample  
Bitstream Vera Sans 14.37% 14.37% Sample  
New York 14.08% 14.08% Sample Image
Textile 13.76% 13.76% Sample Image
Univers 12.93% 12.93% Sample  
Calibri 12.84% 12.84% Sample  
Techno 12.54% 12.54% Sample Image
Corbel 12.23% 12.23% Sample  
Sand 12.23% 12.23% Sample Image
Cambria 11.93% 11.93% Sample  
Consolas 11.62% 11.62% Sample  
Candara 11.01% 11.01% Sample  
Constantia 11.01% 11.01% Sample  
Berthold Akzidenz Grotesk BE 8.26% 8.26% Sample  
ITC Franklin Gothic 6.42% 6.42% Sample  
Interstate 6.42% 6.42% Sample  
TradeGothic 6.42% 6.42% Sample  
Adobe Garamond 5.50% 5.50% Sample  
Bembo 5.50% 5.50% Sample  
Avenir 4.59% 4.59% Sample  
Apple Casual 3.67% 3.67% Sample  
HelveticaNeue 3.67% 3.67% Sample  
New Century Schoolbook 3.36% 3.36% Sample  
Avant Garde 2.75% 2.75% Sample  
Bernhard Modern Std 2.75% 2.75% Sample  
Bookman 2.75% 2.75% Sample Image
Minion Std 2.75% 2.75% Sample  
RotisSemiSans 2.75% 2.75% Sample  
ITC Century 1.83% 1.83% Sample  
Shelley 1.83% 1.83% Sample  
Algerian 1.22% 1.22% Sample  
Caslon 1.22% 1.22% Sample  
Minion Web 1.22% 1.22% Sample  
Utopia 1.22% 1.22% Sample  
Zapf Chancery 1.22% 1.22% Sample Image
Belwe 0.92% 0.92% Sample  
Caflisch Script Pro 0.92% 0.92% Sample  
Kaufmann 0.92% 0.92% Sample  
Porcelain 0.92% 0.92% Sample  
Monotype.com 0.61% 0.61% Sample  
URW Antiqua T 0.61% 0.61% Sample  
Helvetica Narrow 0.31% 0.31% Sample  

Font survey statistics

These figures are the cumulative total of font survey submissions since January 2007. Older submissions are archived to maintain a 3 year rolling sample. The table shows the average submission rate and totals for each operating system, and the the date the applet-based survey was introduced.

Survey Windows Mac Linux
Submissions per week 11 2 2
Submission sample 2050 348 320
Survey applet from 21 April 2007 12 May 2007 21 February 2009
Fonts surveyed 281 117 102

Font stacks for print style sheets

Our main interest is to build reliable font stacks for screen rendering, but CSS allows us to specify a different font stack to print Web pages. The most reliable way to apply print media style sheets is to use the media attribute on the style sheet link element. The selectors you choose and font-family declarations you add to this style sheet will only apply when the page is printed.

<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"
      href="/styles/print.css" media="print" />
    

What font combinations would you choose for print? Use the font stack builder to create a print font stack and submit your ideas.

CSS font family resources

Web font survey and sampler

Contribute to the survey and discover the new Web safe fonts.

Common fonts by generic font family

Set an unconventional font style and stack fallback fonts with confidence.

Web font foundations

Font jargon: CSS font family glossary

Find fonts: Anchor Points: Font foundries & sources

Get the sampler font code: Sampler.css

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