Section Sign §

The Section 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+00A7 in the Universal Character Set.

The section sign (§) is used to reference specific sections of legal documents, regulations, and technical standards. It is standard notation in legal writing (§ 101), academic citations, and government documents. The symbol likely evolved from a pair of overlapping S letters (for the Latin 'signum sectionis').

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 Section 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 section sign when referencing legal codes (§ 230), regulations, contract clauses, and document sections. It is essential for legal and academic web content. The doubled form (§§) indicates multiple sections. In German, the section sign is called 'Paragraph' and is used for legal article references.