Leftwards Dashed Arrow
About this character
The character ⇠ carries the official Unicode name “Leftwards Dashed Arrow” and the code point U+21E0, which is 8672 in decimal. It belongs to the Arrows block (U+2190–U+21FF), which gathers single, double and curved arrows used in typography, mathematics and user interfaces.
In memory, ⇠ takes 3 bytes in UTF-8 (0xE2 0x87 0xA0) and 1 in UTF-16 (0x21E0). That difference is why badly configured forms or databases garble this character: they assume one byte per character.
How to type ⇠
| System | What to do |
|---|---|
| Windows | In Word or WordPad, type 21E0 and press Alt + X to turn the code into the character. |
| macOS | On a Mac, open the Character Viewer with Ctrl + ⌘ + Space and search for “Leftwards Dashed Arrow”. |
| Linux | On Linux (GTK), type Ctrl + ⇧ + U, 21E0 then press Enter. |
| HTML / Web | In an HTML page, write ⇠. Use \21E0 in CSS, \u21E0 in JavaScript and \u21E0 in Python. |
| On this site | The simplest route is the Copy button above: the character goes straight to your clipboard, ready to paste anywhere. |
Keyboards that include ⇠
This character is not on any common physical layout, so the Copy button above is the quickest way to get it into a document.
Codes and encodings
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Code point | U+21E0 |
| Unicode block | Arrows (U+2190–U+21FF) |
| Decimal | 8672 |
| Hexadecimal | 0x21E0 |
| Octal | 020740 |
| Binary | 10000111100000 |
| UTF-8 bytes | 0xE2 0x87 0xA0 |
| UTF-16 units | 0x21E0 |
| Named HTML entity | None |
| Decimal HTML entity | ⇠ |
| Hex HTML entity | ⇠ |
| CSS escape | \21E0 |
| JavaScript escape | \u21E0 |
| Python escape | \u21E0 |
| URL encoding | %E2%87%A0 |
Frequently asked questions
What is the Unicode code for ⇠?
Its code point is U+21E0, which is 8672 in decimal and 020740 in octal. In HTML you can write it as ⇠ or ⇠.
Why does ⇠ show up as a box or a question mark?
An empty box means the font has no glyph for U+21E0. The character is still in the text: switching to a font that covers the block (Noto, DejaVu or Segoe UI Symbol) makes it appear.
Can I use ⇠ in a filename, a URL or a password?
In a URL it must be encoded as %E2%87%A0. Modern filesystems accept it, though it is still risky when moving files between systems. For passwords, some forms reject non-ASCII characters outright.