The 4 best & free monospace fonts for programming in 2020!
Most people don’t know this but ducks have weirdly-shaped dicks. Also, I code. A lot.
In fact, my interest in design started not with me wanting to create logos or book covers but, rather, user interfaces for my apps. However, coding day in and day out with Courier can get pretty fucking boring.
That’s why I went looking for alternative monospaced fonts for my IDE. I found many, but only a few stuck around to contribute to my haphazardly thrown-together loops and conditionals. This list includes my four favorite monospaced fonts for IDE and console use. Bonus: they are all free, with one exception, which is still kinda-free.
#1 Silka Mono
Silka Mono is the only font on this list that’s not really free. As with all of atipo foundry’s typefaces, you can get the standard version by ‘paying’ with a tweet or a share on Facebook. You can also get the full version by paying what you want, as long as what you want is more than $5, ya cheapskate. Bargain.
#2 JetBrains Mono
Contracting JetBrains Mono means that you’ll have to stay in bed for a month, coding feverishly.
Bad joke? Perhaps. Good thing I don’t care.
JetBrains Mono is a super-flexible font, with four weights and matching italics but the best thing about it have to be the 138 (count them!) code-specific ligatures. Never again will you write a lambda expression and have the arrow be a dash and a greater-than sign like a caveman.
#3 Inconsolata
Inconsolata is not as recent as Silka Mono and JetBrains Mono, with development on the font starting back in 2006.
This font is very flexible, coming in a variety of weights and widths. When I first opened the zip file that the typeface came packaged in, I was impressed by the variety of width styles that were included. That initial feeling of being impressed was slowly replaced by amusement when I realized that Inconsolata Condensed and Expanded were merely the tips of the iceberg. How about Inconsolata Extra Condensed, Extra Expanded, Semi Condensed, Semi Expanded, Ultra Condensed, and Ultra Expanded? Yup.
#4 Fira Code
Fira Code comes in five weights with no matching italics, but it makes up for its relative dearth of styles with the inclusion of a boatload of coding ligatures, both general and language-specific, and other cool luxuries such as characters for console UI and math symbols. It also contains Greek and Cyrillic characters and has more arrows than a Robin Hood cosplayer.
What’s that? You want to spend money?
All this free stuff and you still want to buy a monospaced font? Hey, it’s your money, what do I care what you do with it?
If you’re dead-set on buying a monospaced typeface, you need to check out Gintronic. It’s not cheap, but it’s as gorgeous and flexible as they come.
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Antonis Tsagaris is the author of Clothes For Language: An applied typography handbook for designers, authors and type lovers available now as an ebook on Amazon.
