What ⌦ means
Delete forward: remove whatever sits right after the cursor.
The picture is a key cap drawn as a pentagon with an inside. The point tells you which way the erasing travels: ⌦ points right, so it eats the next character or the selected text; points left and eats the previous one. On a Windows PC the two actions have two labelled keys, Delete (or Del) and Backspace, so most PC keyboards print the names rather than the symbol. On a Mac both actions exist too, but they share a word.
That is why many people first notice ⌦ on a Mac. Apple keyboards with a numeric keypad print it on the small key above the arrow cluster, and Mac menus use it in shortcut listings: "⌦" means hold Command and press forward delete. Keyboard guides, app help pages and some keyboards designed to the international standard use the same symbol so the key can be read without a word in any particular language.
Why does my Mac Delete key erase backwards?
Because Apple calls backspace "Delete"; forward delete is a separate action.
On a Mac, the big key at the top right of the letters is labelled Delete but behaves like Backspace on a PC: it erases to the left. A separate key for the ⌦ action is only present on Apple keyboards with a numeric keypad. On a MacBook or a compact keyboard, hold Fn and press Delete to delete forwards; in most text fields Control-D does the same (both as of 2026). Switchers from Windows often go hunting for the real Delete key at first, and this symbol is the one to look for.
Where does the symbol come from?
It is one of a family of standard key-cap pictures.
Keyboard makers wanted signs that do not depend on any one language, so the international standard for keyboard layouts, ISO/IEC 9995-7, collected a set of function symbols: arrows for the cursor keys, for Shift, for Tab, for Escape, for Clear, and the pair and ⌦ for the two deletions. In Unicode, ⌦, , and sit together in the Miscellaneous Technical block while the arrows live in the Arrows block, so manuals and on-screen menus can print the same pictures that appear on the keys.
Technical and neutral: a key label for manuals, menus and keyboard guides, not a message symbol.
Typing ⌦ inserts a character; it never deletes anything.
Part of the collection
What it means when someone sends it to you
3 readingsThat key deletes the character after the cursor, the opposite of Backspace.
Don't confuse it with
2
Related characters
2
Combination ideas
3Worth knowing
- A Mac key says Delete but does what a PC calls Backspace. So Apple's name for the ⌦ action, Forward Delete, needs an extra word: the obvious one is already taken.
- The pointed shape is the whole message: cover the and the pentagon still tells you which neighbour of the cursor is about to vanish.
Questions people ask
4Is ⌦ the same as the Delete key on Windows?
Yes. The Windows Delete (Del) key erases to the right, which is exactly the action ⌦ stands for. Backspace is the action.
Why doesn't anything happen when I paste ⌦?
Because it is just a character. The symbol labels the key; only the physical key or its shortcut deletes text.
Does ⌦ show as a box or a question mark on my phone?
It can. Many common system fonts include it, but a font that lacks it shows a placeholder. The character is still intact and will display fine elsewhere.
Which way does it point in right-to-left languages?
The character itself does not flip. In an Arabic or Hebrew run, forward delete still removes the character logically after the cursor, which usually appears to its left on screen; mixed-direction lines can look different.
More like this
15
Collections with ⌦
1
How to type or find ⌦
- Also called
- forward delete · delete right · forward delete symbol
- Search it as
- delete forward · delete key symbol · mac delete symbol · erase right · ⌦ key · del symbol · keyboard delete icon
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
⌦\2326Codes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.