How to type Five Sixths
To type Five Sixths (⅚), press Alt + 8538 on Windows, holding Alt while typing the digits on the numeric keypad, or write ⅚ in HTML. On any system you can copy it from this page, or enter its codepoint U+215A directly: Ctrl+Shift+U then 215a on Linux, or 215a then Alt+X in Microsoft Word.
Vulgar Fraction Five Sixths
- Copy it
- Unicode
- U+215A
- Windows
- Alt + 8538 needs regedit
| Where | Shortcut | How |
|---|---|---|
| Windows | Alt + 8538 | Above 255, so Windows will not accept it as typed. Copy the character instead. |
| Mac | N/A | Press the keys together. |
| HTML | ⅚ | Paste this into HTML source. |
| Unicode | U+215A | VULGAR FRACTION FIVE SIXTHS |
Other fractions symbols
⅚ lives in the Number Forms block (U+2150-U+218F), fractions and Roman numerals as single characters. Within Unicode it is classified as No, a number that is not a digit. Fractions and superscript digits sit here.
What happens to ⅚ in a search box
⅚ is a precomposed fraction: Unicode says it can be rewritten as 5⁄6, three separate characters. Anything that normalises text to NFKC before comparing it does exactly that, which is why ⅚ pasted into a search field, a URL slug or a username can come back as 5⁄6 and match text that never contained ⅚ at all. NFC, the form this site uses, leaves it alone. Unicode also records its numeric value as 0.8333333333333334, so software that asks a character what number it is gets 0.8333333333333334 rather than an error.
How Five Sixths behaves in software
⅚ takes one column in a terminal. It carries no direction of its own, so in a line that mixes English with Arabic or Hebrew it takes the direction of the text around it rather than forcing one.
Every way to write Five Sixths
| Form | Value |
|---|---|
| Codepoint | U+215A |
| Decimal | 8538 |
| UTF-8 bytes | E2 85 9A |
| UTF-16 bytes | 21 5A |
| HTML entity | ⅚ |
| HTML numeric | ⅚ or ⅚ |
| CSS | \215A |
| JavaScript | \u215A |
| Python | \u215A |
| URL-encoded | %E2%85%9A |
| SVG | 215A.svg · (SIL Open Font License) |
If ⅚ arrives as â…š
Its three UTF-8 bytes E2 85 9A are being read one at a time as Windows-1252. The text is undamaged; the reader has to be told it is UTF-8.