HTML character entities

Reserved characters in HTML must be replaced with character entities.

HTML Entities

In HTML, some characters are reserved.

In HTML, we cannot use the less than symbol (<) and the greater than symbol (>), because browsers may mistakenly think they are tags.

If we want to display reserved characters correctly, we must use character entities (character entities) in the HTML source code.

Character entities are similar to this:

&entity_name;
or
&#entity_number;

To display the less than symbol, we must write it like this: < or <

Tip:The advantage of using entity names instead of numbers is that names are easy to remember. However, the disadvantage is that browsers may not support all entity names (while support for entity numbers is quite good).

Non-breaking space

The commonly used character entities in HTML are non-breaking spaces ( ).

Browsers always truncate spaces in HTML pages. If you write 10 spaces in the text, the browser will delete 9 of them before displaying the page. To increase the number of spaces on the page, you need to use the   character entity.

HTML Example Examples

Experiment with HTML entity symbols:Try It Yourself

Useful Character Entities in HTML

Note:Entity Names Are Case Sensitive!

Display Result Description Entity Name Entity Number
　 Space    
< Less Than Symbol < <
> Greater Than Symbol > >
& And Symbol & &
" Quotation Marks " "
' Apostrophe　 ' (IE does not support) '
￠ Cent (cent) ¢ ¢
£ Pound (pound) £ £
¥ Yen (yen) ¥ ¥
€ Euro (euro) € €
§ Section § §
© Copyright (copyright) © ©
® Registered Trademark ® ®
™ Trademark ™ ™
× Multiplication Symbol × ×
÷ Division Symbol ÷ ÷

For a complete reference of entity symbols, please visit our HTML Entity Symbol Reference Manual.