How can I change Ubuntu fonts to Windows fonts

Ubuntu uses truetype fonts the same as Windows does. Technically, you can also install font that you used under Windows in Linux. What might limit you in reusing the fonts under Linux is the licencing of the fonts. Many fonts that nowadays come with Windows are restrictively licenced, including that you may use these fonts on Windows only. Some people refuse to use fonts, or software, that comes with such restrictive unfree licences.

How you can install fonts in Linux in general is explained in this excellent post.

The "classical" Windows fonts from the '90, i.e., "Times New Roman", "Arial" etc. were distributed by Microsoft in a relatively free licence. That allowed Linux distributions to package them in their repositories. You can install these fonts in your system by installing the package ttf-mscorefonts-installer.

  • Open the terminal
  • Enter the command sudo apt install ttf-mscorefonts-installer
  • A dialog will appear in which you need to accept the licence by which Microsoft distributed these fonts.

Once the fonts are installed, you can have them used by the interface by installing Gnome Tweaks. In the "Fonts" tab, you can change the fonts for various elements of the UI.