What ⩹ means
No; don’t assume it means the usual comparison.
MathML’s operator dictionary specifies placement and spacing, not a universal mathematical rule. In markup, the named entity ⩹ stands for this character.
How was ⩹ described in 1999?
It was proposed alongside a matching greater-than relation.
A 1999 Unicode proposal lists a “less than, circle inside” relation beside its greater-than counterpart. A 2003 ISO/IEC 9573-13 draft for mathematical markup assigned entity names to both forms.
Don't confuse it with
4Questions people ask
1Why does ⩹ 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 ⩹
Windows (Word)
Alt+XType 2A79, then Alt+X to get ⩹.
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 “less-than with circle inside”.
Linux
Ctrl+Shift+UType 2a79, then Enter or Space.
HTML
⩹CSS
\2A79Codes and encoding1 code points
HTML decimal
⩹
HTML hex
⩹
CSS content
content: "\2A79";
Each escape is closed by the next backslash; a trailing space is needed before a literal hex digit.
URL encoded
%E2%A9%B9
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.