My favorite monospaced fonts
Tags: UI, Design, Branding, Typography, Fonts

My favorite monospaced fonts

Being obsessed with pure functionality and perfect readability.

Monospaced fonts are beautiful!

If you’ve read a few of my other pieces, you already know that I’m kinda backwards. I enjoy old tech (where applicable) and the nostalgia and focus associated with using it. So, it comes of no surprise, that I have a thing for old typewriter and computer fonts.

As I am working as a graphics designer, I naturally work a lot with typography and I stumble across new and old fonts on a regular basis. This is the source of my habit collecting fontsets that I like. Especially monospaced fonts.

If you’re a font-afficionado as well, read on to get to know some of the most beautiful and practical monospaced fonts.

Monospace fonts

What does “monospace” mean?

Simple answer: All letters take up the same horizontal space. They all have the same width. This was necessary, back in the day of typewriters and early computers. Typewriters had a fixed number of letters, that could fit into any one line of text, so the letters all had to be the same width. It was similar on early computers, like the C64 and early IBM compatibles. These old computers usually were capable of either showing 40 or 80 characters in a line. Imagine them as separate blocks, that could be inhabited by a character/letter. It was not possible of showing a single letter “between” two blocks, so again, all the characters of a fontset had to have the same width. Each letter had to fit exactly in one block.

Modern fonts today have slimmer (i.e. “l”) or wider letters (i.e. “B”) and are spaced accordingly. The advantage of this is a better use of available space and a more natural looking typography.

This clearly shows the difference between Courier New and Times New Roman.

But monospaced fonts also have several advantages. They’re still being used in machine-processed typography (like in contracts or cheques) and can easily be identified by OCR software (text recognizing software). As the tech behind the software improves though, the “need” for monospaced fonts disappears.

What’s left is people like me who have a personal taste for fonts like this and think that they are easy to read and “fly over” — especially when writing first or second drafts and doing your editing.

1,5 linespace and monospaced fonts go really well together. Many scripts for TV shows or movies are still written this way. It’s perfect for easy consumption and readability.

My favorite monospaced fonts

C64 Pro

This is a remake of the old font on the C64 line of computers back in the 1980’s. For me it’s pure nostalgia. It’s modern-day-use is limited though. I mostly use it for vintage-designs. For huge bodies of text it’s just not convenient, even though the readability is quite good, despite it being pixelated on purpose. Still, a lovely font to have around.

Old Typewriter

Reminiscent of the old Underwoods this typewriter font ist very handy, when designing greeting cards or invitations. To use it as your “draft-font” it’s a bit too heavy on the eyes. Still, if you want just one “old typewriter font” which has plenty of character(s), you should try this one, even if it might see limited use.

Warenhaus Typenhebel

Slightly more modern, this font screams “german Bauhaus”. It’s very versatile and I use it quite regularly in design projects. For using it as a body font in my drafts, it’s not quite there yet. I do enjoy the slight variation in the letters and the hints of imperfection, giving it a natural 1950’s/1960's typewriter look.

TT2020 Base

Welcome to the world of electric typewriters of the 1980’s and 1990’s. Just before typewriters went away to make room for computer aided text processing, they reached the peak in readability and clarity. This delicate font does a very good job recreating that style. It’s perfectly suited for huge bodies of text and it’s also very versatile as it comes in different styles too.

Average Mono

This is a solid alternative to Courier New and it provides a very clear and easy-to-read appearence. It’s just oh-so-slightly different to similar fonts. It’s a really good all-purpose-font with no fuzz. It’s a bit heavier than the TT2020 in it’s regular style, which is a good thing, if you want to use it negatively on a dark background!

Consolas

This font tries to somewhat emulate the font of DOS and your average Windows or Linux terminal, hence the name. It does a terrific job of being perfectly readable, no matter if used in positive or in negative. It’s just perfect, if you want to use it on dark backgrounds. I do use it often in Focus Writer either in green or amber on a black background, to emulate that very-early-computer feel of the 1980’s. It’s versatile and beautiful! Also, I really love that crossed-out “0”.

Adobe Source Code Sans

This font was created by Adobe and yet can be obtained for free. It was meant to be a perfect font for coding, hence the name. I don’t do much coding myself, but I write a lot and what’s good for coders is also usually good for writers. It produces a really clean and sharp text, readability is perfect and the font is very versatile, as it is available in a plethora of styles. Highly recommended for all your coding or writing needs.

Liberation Mono

This font is part of the open source font family “Liberation” — meant as an alternative to Courier New. The whole font package is just lovely. This is the most versatile and easy to read monospaced font for me. Have you seen that beautiful “0”? It’s pure simplistic functionality — what a bliss! Naturally, this is also my favorite monospaced font, all things considered.

Courier New vs. Times New Roman

Most publishers want your manuscript in Times New Roman and that’s the way you should submit them.

But personally, I can’t stand Times New Roman.

It’s just bland and overused. Maybe, it’s because I’m a graphics designer and literally know hundreds of fonts that look better and still serve the same purpose of Times New Roman.

Times New Roman was cooked up way back in the day and can be found on any modern computer — probably that’s why it’s the universal manuscript font. Personally, I enjoy the open source version of Times New Roman coming from the Linux world more: Liberation.

You can download the whole font family (serif — just like Times New Roman, sans serif — just like Arial and mono — just like Courier New) for free, here.