Though you can’t choose any font you wish, you can use these modified Fira Sans fonts to replace Mac OS X Yosemite’s default System Font. Best of all, it’s easy to do and involves absolutely no hacking of system files.
- First, download Fira System Font Replacement.
- Next, drop the fonts into your /Library/Fonts folder. Note that this is not your User Library folder, but the one you see at the root level of your storage drive.
- Now simply relaunch the Finder. To do that, Option+Click the Finder icon in the Dock and choose “Relaunch” from the menu.
You should immediately see the new font appear in all your windows and menus. If you don’t like Fira Sans as the system font, you can simply remove the fonts from the Fonts folder and relaunch the Finder again.
As I stated at the start, this won’t work with just any font. This version of Fira Sans has been altered to supersede Apple’s default system font. The original system fonts haven’t been touched, which is why you can switch back simply by removing the Fira Sans.
These fonts are intended as a system font replacement on Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite. They are based on the Fira Sans font family by Erik Spiekermann and Ralph du Carrois, and are licensed under the Open Font License version 1.1 or later. The System font replacement package has been prepared by Jens Kutilek.
Can I change it back ? I didnt like it. I remove the font from Library/Fonts but didnt work.
Did you relaunch the Finder again?
Yes I did 🙁
I assume you trie restarting the whole Mac as well (though you shouldn’t have to)?
Hello, I do not have my Mac right now so I can’t try the tip. However, I would love that you share your awesome wallpaper with us, if you don’t mind.
That particular one came from the Google Material Design pack. You can read more and get the download link from here:
https://www.thegraphicmac.com/141-free-google-material-design-wallpapers-that-dont-suck
I wished this website also used a more legible font. Extralight Lato doesn’t cut it. How about at least going up a few weights?
You know, I’m glad you requested this, because I’ve been meaning to change it for a while. Hope the new font is more readable.
More legible, yes. But couldn’t you use something a little more adventurous than Arial for a blog about graphics?
While the site is primarily for designers, I do not (and never have) placed a whole lot of effort or focus into the design of this site. That’s not what it’s for, and quite frankly I don’t have time. I’ve always tried to make the site content-focused and as readable as possible – no matter what size screen or resolution, or printed out on a sheet of paper. For those reasons, simple fonts work best.
PS: It’s not Arial.
Brilliant, our accounting software became very unsightly when zooming the screen with the default Yosemite font so we went back to Mavericks. This has made Yosemite now usable for us, many thanks!!
I used the same method with Input System Font, and I llllllove it. Check it out at http://input.fontbureau.com/systemfont/
I tried this and the Sidebar Item text is offset / not horizontally centered . San Francisco font is pretty nice though !
http://gizmodo.com/helvetica-is-the-worst-change-your-yosemite-font-to-sa-1668350413
So how is this font modified from most other fonts? The ‘regular’ fonts use .ttf and .ttc file formats, and they both appear the same when double-clicked and stuff.
Is there a way to modify other fonts so they share this ‘setting’?
Quite more readable than the default Helvetica Neue on my late-2013 iMac. I protested repeatedly on the Apple’s feedback page about losing THE display feature on a 3k-dollar machine, but that doesn’t seem to upset Apple…
OMG thank you so much!! That is a very great improvement for a very little effort.
Hi, I did the above but something went hinky with at least one pop up window. I’m not sure if it was from this or some other thing I was trying to change in Yosemite to get it to work better. (When I try to log in with my password to get into the firewall area, all characters in the pop up window are showing up as a capital A inside a square.) I thought I’d go back and remove the Fira fonts to see if that would solve it but deleting the files and rebooting the system, the system is still showing Fira font and not Helvetica Neue. Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.
This same thing happened to me! Were you ever able to resolve this?
Great, thank you very much!