HTML Special Characters

By Tony 2.19.2024

Let's say you're starting a code tutorial website like this one, and you want to write this line of code within your page: <h1>Hello World!</h1> but whatever you try, you just can't type < > symbols normally. Does that mean you can't do that in HTML? This is what HTML special characters is about. Here is an example:

HTML special characters are typed using "entities" – codes that start with an ampersand (&) and end with a semicolon (;). Numbered entities use a symbol list with over 50,000 symbols. Put a hashtag (#) and the symbol's number code after the ampersand (&) when using numbered entities.

HTML5 also has named entities using letters after & instead of a hashtag and a number that represent letters, punctuation, math, and currency symbols. However, named entities are more limited than numbered entities.

We type special characters in HTML by using codes called numbered intities and named entities. Numbered entities follow the format
&#number-that-represents-the-symbol; and named entities follow the format &letters-that-represent-the-symbol;. HTML special characters are very useful, so remember the important symbols' codes!