HTML: Special Characters

HTML Entities and/or ISO Latin-1 codes can be placed in source code like any other alphanumeric characters to produce special characters and symbols that cannot be generated in HTML with normal keyboard commands.

For example, to render Düsseldorf the HTML source should read

Düsseldorf or Düsseldorf

While many similar lists are available on the Web (run your favorite search engine using "ISO Latin" or "HTML Entities"), none I've seen account for the standard character sets of different operating systems (e.g. Windows vs. DOS vs. Macintosh, etc.); this list should produce the same results on all platforms.

Punctuation	HTML Entity (case sensitive)	ISO Latin-1 code	name or meaning
¡	¡	¡	inverted exclamation
¿	¿	¿	inverted question mark
"	"	"	quotation mark
« »	« »	« »	guillemets (European-style quotation marks)
(Its there, but you can't see it!)			non-breaking space
Symbols
&	&	&	ampersand
¢	¢	¢	cent
©	©	©	copyright
÷	÷	÷	divide
>	>	>	greater than
<	<	<	less than
µ		µ	micron
·	·	·	middle dot
¶	¶	¶	pilcrow (paragraph sign)
±	±	±	plus/minus
£	£	£	British Pound Sterling
®	®	®	registered
§	§	§	section
¥	¥	¥	Japanese Yen
Diacritics
á Á	á Á	á Á	lower-case "a" with acute accent upper-case "A" with acute accent
à À	à À	à À	lower-case "a" with acute accent upper-case "A" with acute accent
â Â	&acric; Â	â Â	lower-case "a" with circumflex upper-case "A" with circumflex
å Å	å Å	å Å	lower-case "a" with ring upper-case "A" with ring
ã Ã	ã Ã	ã Ã	lower-case "a" with tilde upper-case "A" with tilde
ä Ä	ä Ä	ä Ä	lower-case "a" with diaeresis/umlaut upper-case "A" with diaeresis/umlaut
æ Æ	æ Æ	æ Æ	lower-case "ae" ligature upper-case "AE" ligature
ç Ç	ç Ç	ç Ç	lower-case "c" with cedilla upper-case "C" with cedilla
é É	é É	é É	lower-case "e" with acute accent upper-case "E" with acute accent
è È	è È	è È	lower-case "e" with grave accent upper-case "E" with grave accent
ê Ê	ê Ê	ê Ê	lower-case "e" with circumflex upper-case "E" with circumflex
ë Ë	ë Ë	ë Ë	lower-case "e" with diaeresis/umlaut upper-case "E" with diaeresis/umlaut
í Í	í Í	í Í	lower-case "i" with acute accent upper-case "I" with acute accent
ì Ì	ì Ì	ì Ì	lower-case "i" with grave accent upper-case "I" with grave accent
î Î	î Î	î Î	lower-case "i" with circumflex upper-case "I" with circumflex
ï Ï	ï Ï	ï Ï	lower-case "i" with diaeresis/umlaut upper-case "I" with diaeresis/umlaut
ñ Ñ	ñ Ñ	ñ Ñ	lower-case "n" with tilde upper-case "N" with tilde
ó Ó	ó Ó	ó Ó	lower-case "o" with acute accent upper-case "O" with acute accent
ò Ò	ò Ò	ò Ò	lower-case "o" with grave accent upper-case "O" with grave accent
ô Ô	ô Ô	ô Ô	lower-case "o" with circumflex upper-case "O" with circumflex
ø Ø	ø Ø	ø Ø	lower-case "o" with slash upper-case "O" with slash
õ Õ	õ Õ	õ Õ	lower-case "o" with tilde upper-case "O" with tilde
ö Ö	ö Ö	ö Ö	lower-case "o" with diaeresis/umlaut upper-case "O" with diaeresis/umlaut
ß	ß	ß	ess-tsett
ú Ú	ú Ú	ú Ú	lower-case "u" with acute accent upper-case "U" with acute accent
ù Ù	ù Ù	ù Ù	lower-case "u" with grave accent upper-case "U" with grave accent
û Û	û Û	û Û	lower-case "u" with circumflex upper-case "U" with circumflex
ü Ü	ü Ü	ü Ü	lower-case "u" with diaeresis/umlaut upper-case "U" with diaeresis/umlaut
ÿ	ÿ	ÿ	lower-case "y" with diaeresis/umlaut
´ `		´ `	acute accent with no letter grave accent/reversed apostrophe with no letter

Notes:

The " entity was mistakenly omitted from the HTML 3.2 specification. While use of " generates error reports when validating against 3.2, browsers have continued to recognize the entity and its use is generally safe (sticklers may wish to use " instead). The omission has been corrected in the HTML 4.0 specification.

Currently there is no reliable method to produce "curly" or "smart" quotation marks in HTML. Some authors use  and  , but these are outside the ISO-8859-1 code set (see the Web Design Group's discussion) and do not generate quotation marks in all viewing situations.
The non-breaking space (  or  ) can be used not only to prevent the separation of words by line wraps, but also to force a space equal in size to a keyboard/spacebar space (useful for indentation or wider word separation) or to "hold" space in the empty cell of a table (as in the table above).
The middle dot (· or ·) can be used as a bullet and embedded anywhere in text. Because it is equal in size to a period, however, it may be necessary to apply <B> </B> or tags to enhance its graphic effect (use of <FONT SIZE="x"> </FONT> or <BIG> </BIG> elements is not recommended, as these will alter the character's vertical spacing relative to other characters in the same line).