Most common browser fonts by platform

[ktinkel]

Codestyle has recently updated its survey of fonts used on the web. Based on that, I extracted a list of fonts found on from 75% or more of Windows and Mac computers. (I eliminated any found only on one platform or the other.)

There are some funny ones, but the survey is now done by RSS sampling (instead of voluntary actions by users), so it may be right. The list is in order by rank, from most common to less so:

Windows            Mac

Arial Black        Arial Black
Comic Sans MS	   Arial
Verdana            Courier, Courier New*
Arial              Verdana
Courier New*       Comic Sans MS
Impact             Trebuchet MS
Trebuchet MS       Georgia
Georgia            Times, Times New Roman**
Times New Roman*   Impact

* Mac users are as likely to have plain Courier as Courier New; and many Macs also have Andale Mono. Makes sense to list all three in CSS font lists for mono-width fonts (and I put Andale Mono first as it is most legible).

** If you really want to specify Times (which is very small and hard to read on-screen), you should specify it as Times, Times New Roman. But really, best not to specify it at all — if a user has none of the specified serif fonts, they will probably see Times anyway. (Interesting — hard to believe, actually — Times New Roman shows up in the Windows list for only 78% of users.)