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Why use Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif as font family and not just sans-serif?

I don't understand what is the point of doing this? For me it is equally identical, so why should I use Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif and just sans-serif?

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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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