Copyright Sign ©

The Copyright Sign character (©) is a standard HTML entity defined in the HTML specification. In HTML source code, it can be written using the named entity reference ©, the decimal numeric character reference ©, or the hexadecimal numeric reference ©. The character is assigned Unicode code point U+00A9 in the Universal Character Set.

The copyright sign indicates that a work is protected by copyright law. It is one of the most widely used HTML entities, appearing in virtually every website footer. While copyright protection exists automatically in most jurisdictions regardless of whether the symbol is displayed, including it serves as a visible notice to users.

Symbol entities encompass a wide variety of special characters used in legal disclaimers, intellectual property notices, typographic ornaments, card suit indicators, and miscellaneous notation throughout web content. These characters appear in website footers for copyright notices, product pages for trademark symbols, academic papers for dagger footnote markers, and decorative or gaming contexts for card suits and stars.

When deciding how to encode the Copyright Sign character in your HTML documents, the named entity © is generally the most readable choice for developers reviewing or maintaining source code. The decimal form © and hexadecimal form © are equally valid alternatives that work in contexts where named entities may not be supported, or when generating HTML output programmatically from server-side code. All three representations produce identical visual output in every modern web browser.

Use the copyright sign in website footers (© 2024 Company Name), legal notices, and anywhere copyright ownership needs to be indicated. It is one of the essential entities for professional web development and is universally supported across all browsers, email clients, and platforms.