What 琲 means
By itself, 琲 names a string of pearls or beads.
Its dictionary trail begins in the Shuowen supplement, where it names pearls; later Chinese texts use it for jeweled strands. The coffee spelling is related to Chinese forms such as 咖啡, not to the pearl definition. The earliest located Chinese 珈琲 is in 1844’s 海国图志.
Alone it is literary and rare; in 珈琲, it reads as coffee.
If you mean coffee, send 珈琲, not 琲 alone.
What it means when someone sends it to you
2 readings琲 by itself in Chinese
A pearl string or jeweled strand.
琲 inside 珈琲 in Japanese
Coffee, written with Japanese kanji.
Combination ideas
1Japanese kanji spelling for coffee.
Questions people ask
1Why does 琲 show as a box on some devices?
Because that device's fonts have no glyph for it. The character is still correct and still copies correctly — the box is a missing glyph, not a broken character.
How to type 琲
Windows (Word)
Alt+XType 7432, then Alt+X to get 琲.
Windows
Win+Rrun charmap for the full table, or use the emoji picker's Ω symbols tab (Win + .).
macOS
Control+Command+SpaceOpen the character viewer and search “cjk unified ideograph-7432”.
Linux
Ctrl+Shift+UType 7432, then Enter or Space.
HTML
琲CSS
\7432Codes and encoding1 code points
HTML decimal
琲
HTML hex
琲
CSS content
content: "\7432";
Each escape is closed by the next backslash; a trailing space is needed before a literal hex digit.
URL encoded
%E7%90%B2
1
On screen
1
Code points
1
JS .length
3
UTF-8 bytes
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.