What ⁸ means
A raised eight: an exponent, a footnote number, or simply small type. In maths and science the little number sitting up and to the right of something is an exponent, the number of times the base is multiplied by itself. 2⁸ is 256, x⁸ is x to the eighth power, and 10⁸ is a hundred million. Without this character, plain text usually falls back on 28 to say the same thing; ⁸ lets a message or a plain-text document show the real notation.
In books and articles the same little number has a completely different job. A raised number at the end of a sentence or after a word is a note reference: it tells you to look for note 8 at the foot of the page or at the end of the chapter. Word processors create these marks with superscript formatting and number them automatically, but in an email, a chat or a forum post, ⁸ is one way to write that mark by hand.
Outside maths and scholarship, some people use ⁸ simply because it looks small and neat: in social-media handles and bios, in birthday and anniversary posts (“⁸ years”), and in the stylised lettering that fancy-text generators produce. There it means nothing more than 8.
Why use ⁸ instead of superscript formatting?
Because ⁸ goes almost anywhere plain text goes. Superscript styling lives in rich-text documents; paste the text into most chat apps, username fields, subject lines or file names and the styling is usually stripped, dropping the 8 back to the line. ⁸ is a character, so it keeps its raised shape wherever a font can draw it.
The trade-off is that each font decides how big and how high ⁸ is, so next to a “real” formatted superscript in the same document it can look slightly off, and in long formulas the letters and digits may not line up. For a formal paper, use your editor's superscript button or an equation tool and let ⁸ do the job in places that only accept plain text.
Neutral and technical; outside maths and footnotes it is simply tidy styling.
After a plain number, ⁸ makes a power: typing “10⁸” when you meant “108” changes the meaning entirely.
Part of collections
What it means when someone sends it to you
3 readingsAn exponent: the base multiplied by itself eight times.
Don't confuse it with
3
Related characters
1
Combination ideas
6Worth knowing
- ¹, ² and ³ got into computers early with the Latin-1 character set, so layouts such as German put ² within easy reach. ⁴ to ⁹ arrived later in a separate block and rarely get a key of their own.
- In chemistry a small raised number to the left of an element symbol is its mass number (protons plus neutrons): ⁸Be is beryllium-8, a nucleus that falls apart in a tiny fraction of a second.
Questions people ask
3Is ⁸ the same as pressing the superscript button?
Not quite. The button restyles an ordinary 8 and only works inside that document; ⁸ is a separate character that keeps its shape in plain text, but its size and height depend on the font.
Will a search for 8 find ⁸?
It depends. Some search engines and databases quietly treat ⁸ as an ordinary 8; others, along with spellcheckers and sorting, treat it as a different character. For a name or a code people must find, use a plain 8.
Does ⁸ mean something special on its own?
No. Alone it is just a small 8. Its reading as a power or a footnote comes entirely from what stands next to it.
More like this
13
Collections with ⁸
1
How to type or find ⁸
- Search it as
- superscript 8 · raised 8 · small 8 · tiny 8 · 8 exponent · to the eighth power · footnote 8 · power of 8
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
⁸\2078Codes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.