Why use Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif as font family and not just sans-serif?
The default font that the user sees really depends on the browser and their personal settings. If you don't care what font the user sees, except that it is a sans serif font regardless of their system default, use onlyfont-family: sans-serif;
However, you cannot depend on the standard defaults (Helvetica / Arial) as users can change them in their settings. For a more consistent experience / design, etc. Better to specify your font.
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This is an explicit way to tell the browser exactly what fonts you want to use and in what order. As @Greg Hewgill reports, sans-serif
cannot translate on Arial
or Helvetica
on all machines or browsers (even if they are otherwise accessible); it is the browser's prerogative as to which san-serif font to use.
If you don't mind potential ambiguity and do not require tight control over which fonts are used when available, feel free to use sans-serif
; However, for the sites that my firm develops, we tend to be as clear as possible as it is designed to be.
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