How to render thin fonts more smoothly in CSS 3 on Windows?

Question 1

You are never going to get sites to look the same in different browsers or operating systems, they are using different technologies etc etc.

This is something you shouldn't really care about. People who use IE are not going to switch to Firefox or Chrome or vice versa. They are used to the way fonts look and are not going to notice.

Browsers inconsistencies is a thing front end developers have to live with (sadly). Its great if they all look the same but that's not going to happen

Things you can try, you will probably need different fixes for different browsers.:

text-shadow: 1px 1px 1px rgba(0,0,0,0.004);
text-rendering: optimizeLegibility !important;
-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased !important;

Edit 1: DirectWrite is now on chrome for windows which will improve the rendering.

Edit 2 (2017): System UI fonts

Another thing you can try is use system fonts for improved UX.

font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", "Roboto", "Oxygen", "Ubuntu", "Cantarell", "Fira Sans", "Droid Sans", "Helvetica Neue", sans-serif;

Readup - smashingmagazine
Readup - booking.com
Readup - medium

Question 2

I find that in Google Chrome you can add -webkit-text-stoke to improve the appearance of fonts.

for example:

-webkit-text-stroke: .025em rgba(51,51,51,0.50);

-- Note this answer was from 2014 and is probably not a good solution today.

Question 3

text-rendering: optimizeLegibility applies kerning to the font, wich can improve readability, but only if the resolution of the display and font-size is high enough. It doesn't make the font any bolder if it was too thin before.

The problem here could be font-families that have one or more faces that are lighter than normal (font-weight:400) – like Googles Lato.

If you load all light to regular faces of Lato like this

@import url(http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Lato:100,200,300,400);

I made the observation that most Windows browsers and Chrome OSX use font-weight:100 if you specify anything lighter than 400 – (or normal, regular). Changing the font-weight: to 200 or 300 doesn't render any different, although the inspector tools insist the machine is displaying e.g. font-weight:200. Which it isn't.

Removing the lighter weights (100 in my case) solves the problem, and lets me at least use font-weight:200, respectively. Rendering isn't absolutely identical across browsers but similar at least.

@import url(http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Lato:200,300,400);

This of course doesn't solve the actual problem not being able to access light font weights as specified.

Question 4

There's no single fix for this, as far as I'm aware. It's multiple fixes implemented to suit each browser, except IE. Give these a shot:

For Chrome, and any other browser using webkit:

-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased !important;

Place that in your html CSS, or for whatever elements you see fit. You can also add this along with the above:

text-shadow:1px 1px 1px rgba(0,0,0,0.005);

Experiment with different alpha values, but you should keep the shadow sizes as they are.

I'm unaware of anything else you can do, but this should address the biggest problem with Chrome at the very least (plus other webkit browsers).

Question 5

I use this on all sites and it covers most issues with font rendering.

text-rendering: optimizeLegibility !important;
-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased !important;
-moz-osx-font-smoothing: grayscale !important;

Question 6

I ran into a similar issue recently, same font family and size looked differently on Chrome, safari and Firefox. The chrome and firefox look especially thicker. This might not be the best way but worked for me

-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased;
-moz-font-smoothing: unset;
-moz-osx-font-smoothing: grayscale;
font-smoothing: antialiased;
-webkit-backface-visibility: hidden;
-moz-backface-visibility: hidden;
backface-visibility: hidden;

Also, its worth a while to checkout different rendering engines. CSS What are -moz- and -webkit-?

Question 7

I think this is more a Windows problem than a browser problem. The same browsers render the same fonts much more smoothly on other operating systems such as Linux or Mac.

In Chrome, and by extension any webkit browser, you can use the following code to smooth your fonts:

-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased;

or

-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased !important;

Typically, I find that this doesn't do a whole lot. I think we'll just have to wait for Microsoft to do something about it.

Question 8

You may be able to fix this using the css property text-rendering.

Example:

text-rendering: auto
text-rendering: optimizeSpeed
text-rendering: optimizeLegibility
text-rendering: geometricPrecision
text-rendering: inherit

You would probably want to use text-rendering:optimizeLegibilty.

More information here: MDN Text-Rendering

Question 9

Im going to prefix this with its a hack and i dont like it, but it works

transform: rotate(-0.0002deg)

It makes fonts noticeably smooth, albeit slightly thinner

Question 10

It's late but did you ever try hint the font files? Go transfonter site and upload your font files. Then the options area check the auto hint option.