Unicode Symbols Explained

What a symbol is

A Unicode symbol is a character (or, sometimes, a short sequence of characters) that represents a shape or mark rather than a letter or digit - a heart, a star, a check mark. Like any Unicode character, each one has a code point and, usually, an official name from the Unicode Character Database.

Code points, in short

Every character - symbols included - has a fixed number called a code point, written as U+XXXX. This is covered in full in What Is Unicode Text?; the short version for symbols is that the number is what a computer actually stores and transmits, and the name and appearance are just how humans refer to and see it.

Not every symbol is one code point

Some symbols are a sequence - more than one code point that together form a single visual character. The red heart emoji, for example, is the plain heart character plus a second, invisible code point called a variation selector, which tells a system to render it as colored emoji artwork instead of a plain glyph. A symbol's own page on this site always shows whether it's a single character or a sequence, and lists every code point involved - never assume a symbol you see is only one character just because it looks like one.

Variation selectors

A variation selector doesn't change what the base character means - it requests a specific presentation. U+FE0F requests emoji-style (colored) presentation; some contexts instead default to plain text presentation for the same base character. This is exactly why the same-looking symbol can appear as either a plain glyph or colored artwork depending on whether that selector is present.

Text symbols vs. emoji

A text symbol renders in your current font and text color, consistently, everywhere. An emoji is drawn as artwork chosen by the platform, which is why the same emoji can look different across devices. Emoji vs Symbols covers this distinction in full.

Where to find them

This site's symbol library groups symbols into categories - hearts, stars, arrows, math symbols like the multiplication sign, and currency marks like the bitcoin sign - each with real code-point data, not invented facts. Every symbol is real, copyable text: selecting and copying it copies the exact character or sequence, never an image.