Short answer: Tap any letter below to copy it. To type them yourself: on Mac press Option + ‘ for æ, Option + Q for œ, Option + O for ø. On Windows use Alt + 0230, Alt + 0156 and Alt + 0248 on the numeric keypad.
Tap to copy
Need more than these six? The accent keyboard has every accented letter in one grid, with the shortcut for each.
Quick reference
| Character | Unicode name | Code point | HTML | Windows (keypad) | Mac | Word / Outlook |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| æ | Latin small letter AE | U+00E6 | æ | Alt + 0230 | Option + ‘ | Ctrl + Shift + & , a |
| Æ | Latin capital letter AE | U+00C6 | Æ | Alt + 0198 | Shift + Option + ‘ | Ctrl + Shift + & , A |
| œ | Latin small ligature OE | U+0153 | œ | Alt + 0156 | Option + Q | Ctrl + Shift + & , o |
| Π| Latin capital ligature OE | U+0152 | Π| Alt + 0140 | Shift + Option + Q | Ctrl + Shift + & , O |
| ø | Latin small letter O with stroke | U+00F8 | ø | Alt + 0248 | Option + O | Ctrl + / , o |
| Ø | Latin capital letter O with stroke | U+00D8 | Ø | Alt + 0216 | Shift + Option + O | Ctrl + / , O |
Only one of these three is actually a ligature
They get grouped together because they look like fused vowels, but Unicode’s own names tell a different story — and the names decide how software treats them.
œ is a true ligature. Unicode calls it LATIN SMALL LIGATURE OE, and in French it is a linguistic ligature, not a decorative one: the two letters fuse into a single grapheme that carries its own sound.
æ is not called a ligature at all. Its Unicode name is LATIN SMALL LETTER AE. It began life as a ligature in Latin and Old English, but in Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic and Faroese it is a full letter of the alphabet, so Unicode encodes it as a letter.
ø is not remotely a ligature. It is LATIN SMALL LETTER O WITH STROKE — an O with a line through it, the same way ł is an L with a stroke. Nothing is fused. It only joins this group because English speakers meet all three in the same Scandinavian and French words.
Here’s the part that matters technically. Real typographic ligatures like fi (U+FB01) carry a compatibility decomposition: normalise the text and fi splits back into f + i automatically. None of æ, œ or ø do that. Under Unicode normalisation they stay exactly as they are, because they are letters in their own right, not display shortcuts. So a database that quietly normalises text will turn fi into “fi” but will leave æ untouched — which is correct behaviour, and worth knowing before you assume “ae” and “æ” are interchangeable anywhere in your stack. If any of this is new, the Unicode primer covers the underlying model.
Windows
With a numeric keypad, hold Alt and type the code with the leading zero, then release:
- Turn Num Lock on.
- Hold Alt.
- Type 0230 (æ), 0198 (Æ), 0156 (œ), 0140 (Œ), 0248 (ø) or 0216 (Ø) on the keypad.
- Release Alt.
The Alt + 156 trap. Codes typed without a leading zero use the old CP437 code page; codes with a leading zero use Windows-1252. They are different tables, and for these letters the difference bites:
- Alt + 0156 gives œ. Alt + 156 gives £. There is no CP437 code for œ at all.
- ø and Ø likewise have no CP437 code. Only Alt + 0248 and Alt + 0216 work.
- æ and Æ are the exception — they exist in both tables, so Alt + 145 and Alt + 0230 both produce æ. That is unusual, and it is why æ “works” for some people while œ mysteriously doesn’t.
If the codes do nothing at all, your keyboard has no real numeric keypad — the top-row numbers never work for Alt codes. Why Alt codes don’t work covers the fixes.
No keypad? In Word, Outlook and PowerPoint, type the hex code and press Alt + X: 00E6 → æ, 0153 → œ, 00F8 → ø. Word also has dedicated shortcuts — Ctrl + Shift + & then a or o for æ and œ, and Ctrl + / then o for ø.
Anywhere in Windows, press Windows key + . to open the emoji panel, click the Ω symbols tab, and pick from the Latin symbols set.
Mac
This is the one platform where all three have proper built-in shortcuts on the standard US layout — no Character Viewer needed:
| Press | Result |
|---|---|
| Option + ‘ | æ |
| Shift + Option + ‘ | Æ |
| Option + Q | œ |
| Shift + Option + Q | Π|
| Option + O | ø |
| Shift + Option + O | Ø |
You can also press and hold the A or O key on the on-screen or physical keyboard and pick from the popup, the same gesture used for accents on a US keyboard.
iPhone and Android
Press and hold the base letter, slide to the character, release:
- Hold a → æ appears alongside à á â ä ã å.
- Hold o → ø appears alongside ô ö ò ó õ.
œ is the awkward one on phones. It is not in the English-layout popup on Gboard or the Samsung Keyboard, and it is inconsistent on iOS. The reliable routes are to copy it from the buttons above, or to add a French keyboard (Settings → General → Keyboard on iOS; Settings → System → Languages & input on Android) and switch to it with the globe key.
If you type these letters daily, set up text replacements instead — “aeg” → æ, “oel” → œ — so you never hunt for them again.
Linux and ChromeOS
Compose key (once enabled in your desktop’s keyboard settings) is the fastest route:
- Compose, a, e → æ
- Compose, o, e → œ
- Compose, /, o → ø
Unicode input works in most GTK apps: Ctrl + Shift + U, type e6, 153 or f8, then press Enter or Space.
On a Chromebook, Ctrl + Shift + U works in most text fields; where it doesn’t, use the on-screen keyboard’s press-and-hold popups.
HTML, CSS and code
All six have named entities, which is the safest choice in HTML because they survive encoding mistakes that raw characters don’t:
html
æ Æ <!-- æ Æ -->
œ Œ <!-- œ Œ -->
ø Ø <!-- ø Ø -->In CSS content and JavaScript, escape with the code point: \00E6, \0153, \00F8 in CSS; \u00E6, \u0153, \u00F8 in JavaScript.
Set the language. Wrap Danish or French text in <span lang="da"> or <span lang="fr"> so screen readers pronounce these letters correctly instead of reading them as English. See how screen readers announce symbols for why this matters more than it looks.
When to use them — and when not to
French: œ is required, but not everywhere. Words where the two letters fuse into one sound take the ligature: cœur, sœur, œil, bœuf, œuf, chœur, mœurs, manœuvre, œuvre. Words where o and e are pronounced separately do not: coefficient, coexistence, moelle. Writing “coeur” is a spelling error; writing “cœfficient” is also one. In French the character is called e dans l’o. Our French typing guide covers the full accent set.
Danish and Norwegian: æ and ø are letters, not decorations. Both alphabets have 29 letters — a–z followed by æ, ø, å, in that order, standardised in 1917 for Norwegian and 1948 for Danish. They are not variants of a and o, and they sort after z. That means Ålesund files at the end of an alphabetical list, not near the top, and a contact list ending in æble, ønske, år is correctly sorted. Substituting “ae” and “oe” (Koebenhavn for København) is an ASCII-era workaround, not modern spelling.
English: mostly archaic. Encyclopædia, fœtus and diarrhœa are historical spellings. American English drops to a plain e (encyclopedia, fetus), British English keeps the o but loses the ligature (diarrhoea). Use the ligature only when reproducing a title or name that carries it.
Never use ø as a symbol. It is a letter, and it is not the empty set. The empty set is ∅ (U+2205), a mathematical symbol, and a slashed zero is a font feature of the digit 0 — not a separate character at all. Using ø for either breaks search, sorting and screen readers.
Search and sorting
Two practical consequences people hit constantly:
Plain search will not match. Searching “encyclopaedia” does not find “encyclopædia” — the strings are different lengths and share no matching substring. Most site search engines and databases need explicit collation or transliteration rules to treat them as equivalent. If you publish names containing these letters, include an “ae”/”oe” spelling somewhere on the page.
Sorting depends on locale. Under a Danish collation, æ sorts after z. Under a default English collation it usually sorts near a. The same list of names will come out in two different orders on two different systems, and neither is a bug.
Troubleshooting
| Problem | Fix |
|---|---|
| Alt + 156 gives £, not œ | Add the leading zero: Alt + 0156. Codes without a zero use CP437, which has no œ. |
| Alt codes do nothing | You need a real numeric keypad with Num Lock on; top-row numbers never work. See Alt codes not working. |
| Option + Q gives a different character | You’re not on the US layout. Check Keyboard settings, or use the press-and-hold popup instead. |
| œ missing from the phone keyboard popup | Expected on English layouts. Copy it above, or add a French keyboard. |
| Character shows as a box or question mark | Font coverage gap. æ ø are near-universal; œ is missing from a few older display fonts. See symbol showing as a box. |
| Æ pastes as “AE” | Something in the pipeline is transliterating to ASCII — often a form field, a URL slug generator or an old database column. Check the column encoding is UTF-8. |
| Screen reader mispronounces the word | Set lang="da" or lang="fr" on the containing element. |
Recap
| If you’re on | Do this |
|---|---|
| Mac | Option + ‘ (æ), Option + Q (œ), Option + O (ø) |
| Windows with a keypad | Alt + 0230, Alt + 0156, Alt + 0248 |
| Windows without a keypad | Type 00E6 / 0153 / 00F8, then Alt + X |
| iPhone or Android | Hold a for æ, hold o for ø; copy œ |
| Linux or ChromeOS | Compose a e / o e / / o, or Ctrl + Shift + U |
| Writing HTML | æ œ ø |
Frequently asked questions
Is æ a ligature or a letter?
Both, depending on the language. Unicode names it LATIN SMALL LETTER AE, not a ligature, because in Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic and Faroese it is a full letter of the alphabet. In Latin and Old English it originated as a ligature of a and e.
Why does Alt + 156 give me £ instead of œ?
Because Alt codes without a leading zero use the old CP437 code page, where 156 is the pound sign. Codes with a leading zero use Windows-1252. Use Alt + 0156 for œ. There is no CP437 code for œ at all.
Is ø the same as the empty set ∅?
No. ø is U+00F8, a Danish and Norwegian letter meaning nothing mathematical. The empty set is U+2205, a separate mathematical symbol. They look similar in some fonts but sort, search and read aloud completely differently.
Do I have to write cœur instead of coeur in French?
Yes. In words where o and e fuse into a single sound — cœur, sœur, œil, bœuf, œuf — the ligature is the correct spelling and “oe” is an error. In words where the letters are pronounced separately, such as coefficient and coexistence, you use plain o and e.
How do I type æ and ø on a Mac?
Press Option + ‘ for æ and Option + O for ø, adding Shift for the capitals. Both are built into the standard US layout, so no Character Viewer or special keyboard is needed.
Why doesn’t searching for “encyclopaedia” find “encyclopædia”?
Because æ is a single character, not the two letters a and e, so the two spellings share no matching text. Search engines and databases only treat them as equivalent when a collation or transliteration rule is configured to do so.
Written by Igor R. Tested on Windows 11, macOS, ChromeOS, Linux (IBus), iOS and Android. Last updated August 2026. Symbol code points follow the Unicode Standard.