Masculine Ordinal Indicator
Block: Latin-1 Supplement
- Symbol
- º
- Unicode
U+00BA- Unicode name
- MASCULINE ORDINAL INDICATOR
- Block
- Latin-1 Supplement
- Category
- Letter, Other
- Type
- Unicode character
Masculine Ordinal Indicator (º) is encoded as U+00BA and has the formal Unicode name MASCULINE ORDINAL INDICATOR. Unicode classifies it as Letter, Other in the Latin-1 Supplement block. The masculine ordinal indicator is a letter-like character used in ordinal abbreviations in some languages. The code point is the stable identifier when fonts, copy-and-paste, or surrounding context make the glyph ambiguous.
Where You Encounter Masculine Ordinal Indicator
The masculine ordinal indicator is a letter-like character used in ordinal abbreviations in some languages.
Need to identify another character? Use identify the º symbol with the symbol itself, its Unicode value, or a description of how it looks.
Code-Point and UTF-8 Forms for º
U+00BA = decimal 186 = HTML º / º. A Unicode escape-style form is u00BA. Its UTF-8 bytes are C2 BA.
Use these identifiers in markup, source code, exports, or character diagnostics when the glyph alone is not enough.
º Compared With °, ∘, and ˚
This character is linked with nearby or confusable records including ° Degree Sign (U+00B0), ∘ Ring Operator (U+2218), and ˚ Ring Above (U+02DA). The relationship is useful for identification, but it does not make those characters interchangeable.
Fonts can reduce or exaggerate visual differences, so use each character's Unicode value and name when the distinction matters. Replacing one code point with another can change meaning, search behavior, parsing, sorting, or typography even when the glyphs appear close on screen.
Use U+00BA Instead of a Look-Alike
Use º when the text is intended to contain Masculine Ordinal Indicator (U+00BA).
This is a character-identity rule rather than a style preference. Search, normalization, parsing, sorting, and copy-and-paste workflows can distinguish code points even when a reader cannot immediately see the difference.
Unicode Identity First, Local Meaning Second
º is encoded as U+00BA and classified as Letter, Other.
The Unicode identity and the surrounding document answer different questions: the code point tells you which character is present, while the surrounding formula, interface, document, or notation system determines the local interpretation. Keeping those layers separate prevents a visual guess from being treated as a character definition.