I experience sans serif suffering and the lack of consistency in fixed width font choices. Given multiple systems installations in multiple GNU/Linux environments, this post serves as a personal reminder to myself; maybe someone else will benefit.
Best monospaced (fixed width) font
Consolas Regular 10.5
Runner up:
Andale Mono Regular 10.5
Why 10.5? Interestingly, I've noticed that Consolas Regular 10 is significantly smaller when rendered than Andale Mono Regular 10. When I bump the rendering up to 10.5 point, the size of Andale Mono doesn't change, but Consolas does increase slightly. Andale Mono renders with extremely crisp and clean thin lines. Consolas looks just slightly "fatter" and is easier for me to read.
Best sans serif (and default font)
Noto Sans 16
Runner up:
DejaVu Sans 16
Noto Sans scales well and doesn't waste space between ascenders and decenders.
Best serif font
Runners Up:
Adobe Source Serif Pro
DejaVu Serif
In my experience, serif fonts that are supposedly used for screen reading tend to be obnoxiously tall / skinny. DejaVu Serif offers very uncrowded letters and is very legible on screens at larger sizes but at smaller sizes the height of the characters begins to suffer with much wasted screen real estate. Source Serif Pro is quite well balanced -- although I do wish it was slightly wider. A balance between Source Serif and DejaVu Serif was welcomed by this author, and Merriweather fits the bill.
I've screen tested other options, including Atkinson Hyperlegible (which I do VERY much like at higher font sizes but not at small ones). Noto Serif is just too skinny/tall.
