Special Characters — Copy & Paste
Click any symbol to copy it: em and en dashes, arrows, math signs, currency, ©, ®, ™, stars, check marks, fractions and the accented letters of French, Spanish, German and the Nordic languages. Search by name, and your last ten copies stay in a row for quick reuse. Free, no sign-up.
Punctuation
Arrows
Math
Currency
Stars & marks
Legal
Accents
Fractions
How to Use the Special Characters Tool
- Search or browse. Type a name such as
em dash,arrow,euroorcheck, or scroll the categories. Searching by the symbol itself works too. - Click the symbol. It is copied to your clipboard and the tile briefly says Copied.
- Paste it. Use Ctrl+V or Cmd+V in your document, email or post.
- Reuse it. The last ten symbols you copied appear in a Recently copied row, so a symbol you need repeatedly is one click away.
What Is in the Grid
The grid is a short list of the symbols people look up most, not the whole of Unicode. Every entry is a single standard Unicode character and accented letters are the precomposed form (one character, not a letter plus a floating accent), so they match when you search for the word later.
| Category | Examples | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Punctuation | — – … « » ¿ ¡ § ¶ † ‡ • · | Dashes, ellipsis, guillemets, section and paragraph signs, daggers for footnotes |
| Arrows | → ← ↑ ↓ ↔ ⇒ ⇐ ↗ ↘ | Single and double arrows, diagonals |
| Math | ± × ÷ ≠ ≈ ≤ ≥ ∞ √ ∑ π ° µ | Operators, comparison signs, pi, the degree sign and the micro sign |
| Currency | € £ ¥ ¢ ₹ ₩ | Euro, pound, yen, cent, rupee, won |
| Stars & marks | ★ ☆ ✓ ✗ ✦ ♥ ♦ | Ratings, check and cross marks, hearts and diamonds |
| Legal | © ® ™ | Copyright, registered trademark, trademark |
| Accents | é è ê ñ ü ö ç å ø æ œ and capitals | Acute, grave, circumflex, tilde, umlaut, cedilla, ring, slash and ligatures |
| Fractions | ½ ⅓ ¼ ¾ ⅔ ⅛ | Single-character fractions |
Dashes: Which One to Copy
| Mark | Name and code point | Use |
|---|---|---|
| - | Hyphen-minus, U+002D (the key on your keyboard) | Compound words and word breaks |
| – | En dash, U+2013 | Ranges and connections: pages 10–20, 1990–1999; APA and Chicago use it for page ranges in references |
| — | Em dash, U+2014 | A break in a sentence — like this one |
| − | Minus sign, U+2212 (not in the grid) | True subtraction and negative numbers in typeset math |
Look-Alikes That Are Not the Same Character
- µ and μ. The grid gives the micro sign (U+00B5), which Unicode treats as a compatibility twin of the Greek letter μ (U+03BC). Many fonts draw them identically, but software can treat them as different characters, so a search for one may not find the other.
- ° and º. The degree sign (U+00B0) is the one for temperatures and angles. The masculine ordinal indicator º (U+00BA), used in Spanish and Portuguese numbers, looks similar but is a letter.
- ∑ and Σ. The summation sign ∑ (U+2211) is a math operator; Σ (U+03A3) is the Greek capital sigma. Use the first in formulas typed as plain text.
- × and x. The multiplication sign × (U+00D7) is what you want in "3 × 4" and "4 × 6 in"; a letter x is read as a letter.
Typing Them Without Copying
| Symbol | Windows (hold Alt, type on the numeric keypad) | Mac (US keyboard) |
|---|---|---|
| — em dash | Alt+0151 | Option+Shift+- |
| – en dash | Alt+0150 | Option+- |
| … ellipsis | Alt+0133 | Option+; |
| © copyright | Alt+0169 | Option+G |
| ® registered | Alt+0174 | Option+R |
| ™ trademark | Alt+0153 | Option+2 |
| € euro | Alt+0128 | Option+Shift+2 |
| ° degree | Alt+0176 | Option+Shift+8 |
| ± plus-minus | Alt+0177 | Option+Shift+= |
| ≠ not equal | No standard Alt code | Option+= |
The Alt codes follow the Windows Western code page and need a keyboard with a numeric keypad and Num Lock on; on a laptop without one, copying is quicker. In Word, typing the hex code and pressing Alt+X also works, for instance 2014 then Alt+X for an em dash. On a phone, long-press a letter for its accents.
When a Symbol Shows Up as an Emoji
Some symbols in the grid — ↔ ↗ ↘ ♥ ♦ © ® ™ — are also on Unicode's emoji list. They are defined to appear as plain text symbols, but some phones and chat apps draw them as colored emoji. Adding the text variation selector (U+FE0E) after the character asks for the plain form. The rest of the grid has no emoji versions.
Which Tool Do You Need?
| You want | Use |
|---|---|
| Common typographic, math, currency and accent symbols | This page |
| Emoji, searched by name with skin tones | Emoji Search |
| Japanese emoticons such as (◕‿◕) | Kaomoji Picker |
| Any fraction, such as ¹⁷⁄₂₄, not just ½ and ¼ | Unicode Fraction Generator |
| The LaTeX command for a math symbol | LaTeX Symbol Finder |
| The name and code point of a character you already have | Unicode Character Inspector |
| A blank or invisible character | Invisible Character |
A note on accessibility
Screen readers read symbols by name or skip them: ★ may be announced as "black star", ✓ as "check mark", and a row of five stars as five repeated names. If a symbol carries meaning — a rating, a yes or no, a price — say it in words as well ("4 out of 5", "included"). Decorative symbols are fine, in moderation.
Frequently Asked Questions
- How do I copy a special character?
- Click the symbol in the grid and it is copied to your clipboard; the tile briefly says Copied and the symbol joins the Recently copied row. Then paste it with Ctrl+V or Cmd+V.
- How do I find a specific symbol quickly?
- Type its name in the search box — "em dash", "arrow", "euro", "check" — and the grid filters as you type, hiding categories with no match. You can also paste the symbol itself into the box to confirm it is in the grid.
- What is the difference between an em dash and an en dash?
- The em dash (—) marks a break or aside in a sentence. The en dash (–) is shorter and joins a range or connection, such as pages 10–20 or the years 1990–1999. Neither is the hyphen (-) on your keyboard, which joins words.
- How do I type accented letters without this tool?
- On a Mac hold Option and press a key (Option+E then e gives é); on Windows use an Alt code (Alt+0233 for é) or switch to the US-International keyboard; on a phone long-press the letter. Copying from the grid works the same on every device.
- Will these characters paste correctly everywhere?
- In almost all current software, yes — they are standard Unicode and the common ones are in every font. A few, such as ₹ or ✦, may be missing from older fonts and show as an empty box, and ↔ ♥ © ® ™ can turn into colored emoji in some apps.
- Does the grid include every symbol?
- No. It is a curated list of the symbols people look up most. For emoji, Japanese emoticons, arbitrary fractions, LaTeX symbols or looking up any character by code point, the tools linked in the table above go further.