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−

minus sign

Minus sign

19/256

− is the true minus sign: it means subtract (12 − 3) or negative (−5 C). It is a different character from the short hyphen-minus - on your keyboard, which many people type instead. The real one is as wide as and lines up with it, which is why books and maths texts prefer it.

Text symbol

What − means

Yes: same meaning, different character. The keyboard key types the hyphen-minus, a typewriter-era compromise that serves as both hyphen and minus. The true minus sign is wider, as wide as and the digits, and sits at their middle height, so 7 − 2 and 7 2 line up neatly.

The difference matters when a computer reads the text. Many spreadsheets and most programming languages expect the keyboard hyphen-minus, so a number like −40 pasted from a web page may be treated as text instead of a negative number, and code containing − usually fails. Rule of thumb: − for text people read, - for anything a computer must calculate.

Where did the minus sign come from?

It first appears in print in a German merchants' arithmetic of 1489. Johannes Widman's book used − and to mark deficit and surplus in quantities of goods. Only later did mathematicians adopt them as the signs for subtraction and addition, and later still for negative numbers.

Part of collections

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Math Symbols
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Dash & Hyphen Symbols
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Don't confuse it with

5
-
Hyphen-Minus
Keyboard hyphen-minus: shorter and often sits lower. Use it in code, spreadsheets and calculators.
–
En Dash
En dash, for ranges like 9–5. Close in length, but it is punctuation.
⁻
Superscript Minus
Superscript minus, raised and small, as in 10⁻³.
➖
Minus
Heavy minus emoji, often shown as a bold or coloured picture in chats.
‒
Figure Dash
Figure dash, digit-wide for phone numbers like 555‒0199; not a subtraction sign.

Combination ideas

5
Five minus three equals two.
Ten degrees below freezing.
A twenty percent drop.
Lost five kilograms.
The four basic arithmetic operations.

Worth knowing

  • In Norway, and in older Danish texts, means minus, not division: the same sign that an English textbook uses for dividing.

Questions people ask

1

Can I use an en dash instead of the minus sign?

It can be a fallback. Finnish and Swedish typography use – as a minus, while English style guides prefer the true −. For anything a spreadsheet must calculate, type the keyboard -.

Collections with −

3
📈Stock Market & Finance Emoji160 symbols🇦🇶Antarctica Emoji & Symbols102 symbols🇸🇯Svalbard & Jan Mayen Emoji97 symbols

How to type or find −

Also called
true minus · math minus · Unicode minus
Search it as
minus symbol · subtraction sign · negative sign · real minus · U+2212
Shows up in
Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
Windows (Word)
⎇Alt+XType 2212, then AltX 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 “minus sign”.
Linux
⎈Ctrl+⇧Shift+UType 2212, then Enter or Space.
HTML
−
CSS
\2212
Word (Windows)
Type 2212, then press AltX.
Windows
Hold Alt and type 8722 on the numeric keypad; works in many, not all, programs.
Mac
Edit Emoji & Symbols, search "minus". Optionhyphen gives the en dash, not the minus.
Linux (GNOME and similar)
CtrlShiftU, type 2212, then Space or Enter.
HTML
− or −
LaTeX
Inside a formula between dollar signs, as in 5-3, a plain - prints the true minus.
Codes and encoding1 code points
HTML decimal
−
HTML hex
−
CSS content
content: "\2212";
Each escape is closed by the next backslash; a trailing space is needed before a literal hex digit.
URL encoded
%E2%88%92
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.

Families this belongs to

1

Maths & numbers1,835 symbols

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