Superscript Generator

How the superscript generator works

Unicode has raised and lowered versions of most letters and all ten numbers, made for math, chemistry and phonetics. This tool swaps each of your characters for its raised or lowered version. Because they are ordinary characters, they stay raised wherever you paste them, even in apps with no formatting at all.

Tiny is the superscript style: every character sits above the line. Subscript drops them below the line.

Which letters and numbers have a superscript

Unicode never filled in every raised and lowered character, so each style has gaps. Missing ones stay as they are:

• Superscript (Tiny): every small letter but q, the numbers 0 to 9 and the signs +, -, = and parentheses. Unicode has only a few raised capitals, so capitals come out as raised small letters.
• Subscript: only 17 letters (a, e, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, r, s, t, u, v and x), plus the numbers and the same signs. The other letters stay full size.

What people use superscript for

Raised numbers are where superscript earns its keep:

• Exponents and units: x², 10⁶, m² and cm³.
• Footnote marks in a bio, caption or post: a ¹ after a claim and the note below.
• Ordinals: 1ˢᵗ, 2ⁿᵈ and 3ʳᵈ.
• Chemical formulas, with subscript: H₂O and CO₂.

Why ¹, ² and ³ can look different

The raised 1, 2 and 3 are older characters than the other raised numbers, added long before the rest. Some fonts draw them a little bigger or lower than ⁰ and ⁴ to ⁹, so a number like 10¹² can look uneven. Raised letters can be uneven too, because they come from several parts of Unicode. Check how it looks before you post.

Superscript shortcuts in Word and Google Docs

Documents can raise text on their own, and there you should use their way, because it keeps real letters that search, spell check and screen readers understand. Select the text, then press:

• Google Docs: Ctrl + . on Windows, or ⌘ + . on a Mac. For subscript, use a comma instead of the period.
• Word on Windows: Ctrl + Shift + +.
• PowerPoint: Ctrl + Shift + + on Windows, or Control + Shift + + on a Mac. For subscript, Ctrl + = or Control + =.

Where copied superscript is the way to go

Names, bios, captions, comments and chats have no superscript button and no shortcut. That is where the copied characters from this page work, because the raised letters are part of the text itself.

For small capitals and other tiny letters, see the small text generator. Every other style is in the full list of copy and paste fonts.

Keep it to a few characters

Screen readers often read raised characters as "superscript two" or skip them, and search inside an app may not find a word written in superscript. Raise a number or a footnote mark, not a whole sentence.