Variation Selector-138

It selects a specific glyph only after a compatible CJK base. By itself, 󠅹 has no message, picture, or formatting effect. It matters only as the second half of a registered pair: a Chinese, Japanese, or Korean character followed by a selector listed in Unicode’s Ideographic Variation Database. The selector has no independent job; the same selector number can request different glyph restrictions after different base characters.

The recorded proposal history reaches 1997-12-01. By 2003, the design had become a registration system for base-character-plus-selector pairs; its first IVD release was 2007-12-14. It addressed a practical split: search can treat related CJK characters alike, while a person’s name, place name, government record, or historical document may need one exact glyph. Because variant traditions differ by period and region, the system uses separate registered collections instead of one universal list.

Why is Variation Selector-138 invisible?

Unsupported or unregistered pairs fall back to the base character. If the app or font does not support a valid pair, it shows the base character normally and leaves the selector invisible. A font with variation-sequence support can use its Format 14 table to choose another glyph. The selector remains in the text even when display falls back, so a copied or compared string can differ from the bare base without looking different.

As of 2026-08-03, Unicode’s IVD_Sequences file contains no registered sequence using E0179. Adding VS138 after an arbitrary character is therefore not a reliable way to alter its appearance; unregistered ideographic variation sequences should not be used for text interchange.