Maple Mono NF
A rounded open-source monospace with an unusually large ligature set and the finest-grained feature control of the group.
Homebrew cask Direct download Direct download
What it does
Maple Mono is a rounded monospaced family with smooth curves, a generous ligature set, and careful CJK support in its wider variants. The NF build is Nerd Font patched.
It reads softer than JetBrains Mono, which some people find less fatiguing over a long day and others find less precise. It is a preference, not a ranking.
Ligatures and OpenType features
Maple exposes more of itself than most monospaced fonts: cvXX character variants, ssXX stylistic sets and zero, with the “normal” preset shipping cv01, cv02, cv33, cv34, cv35, cv36, cv61, cv62, ss05, ss06, ss07, ss08 enabled.
Two things are specific to this family:
- The variable build needs
calton for any of the features to take effect. The upstream advice is to avoid the variable build unless you need it. - Features can be frozen into the font file rather than configured per application. The build script’s
--featflag bakes a choice in —--feat zero,cv01,ss07,ss08— and--no-ligaproduces a build with the ligatures removed outright. A browser-based Custom Build playground does the same without a local toolchain, which is the usual way people get exactly the font they want.
Freezing is the answer for anything that cannot express OpenType features — Xcode, most GUI diff tools, anything rendering to an image.
The syntax for switching any of these on or off, per editor and per terminal, is on the Fonts page.
Alternative to
| Alternative | Type | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|
| Recursive Mono | Open source | Variable, with a similarly soft feel |
| Comic Code | Paid | The other well-known rounded coding font |
| Cascadia Code | Open source | Rounder than JetBrains Mono without going as far |
Install
brew install --cask font-maple-mono-nf