Will Segoe UI work on Mac?

Question

Is Segoe UI font built into the browser? If my visitors are viewing from Mac, will it work properly or do I have to set the CSS url for that? My designer says it will work only when we set the URL, however I removed the

@font-face
{
    font-family: "Segoe UI";
    src: url("fonts/Segoe UI.ttf") format("truetype");
    font-style: normal;
    font-weight: normal;
}

and it still works atleast on Windows 7. I don't have Mac though, to test.

Answer 1

The Segoe UI font is not built into a browser. It is shipped with some Microsoft software. On a Mac, it is most probably not available, though a user might have acquired it separately or as part of some software package.

You should remove the @font-face rule and the font files uploaded onto a server. Segoe UI is protected by copyright, and it must not be used as a web font without permission from the copyright holder, Microsoft (which probably won’t give a permission).

You will need some other strategy, such as using another font either as the basic font or as a fallback font for visitors who don’t have Segoe UI in their systems. The Google font Open Sans is rather similar to Segoe UI, and it’s free (and it comes in 10 styles, including Book, Normal, Semi-Bold, Bold, and Extra-Bold weight).

Answer 2

It will work on any computer with Office 2007, 2010, Vista or 7:

The Segoe UI font family can be obtained as part of Microsoft Office 2007, Microsoft Office 2010, Windows Vista or Windows 7.

Will also work on XP if the user has downloaded a Windows Live package:

Segoe UI is installed into Windows XP if the user installs Windows Live Messenger, or Windows Live Mail

Source

For any computer that doesn't have the above, you will need to declare it with a @font-face