Superscript and Subscript Generator

What this tool does

Unicode contains characters that are visually superscript or subscript versions of other characters. They are separate code points, not formatting, which is why they keep their position when the surrounding text is stripped of formatting: in a plain-text email, a tweet, a file name, a spreadsheet cell or a database column that accepts only text.

Common uses are chemical formulae, mathematical powers, references, and stylised social-media text where formatting is not available.

Method

The text is mapped character by character to its Unicode superscript or subscript counterpart. Digits and the operators plus, minus, equals and brackets have forms in both styles; letters have forms for a subset of the alphabet only. Anything without a counterpart is left exactly as it was, and the tool reports how many characters could not be converted so the result is never silently wrong.

Plain	Superscript	Subscript
0 1 2 3	⁰ ¹ ² ³	₀ ₁ ₂ ₃
a e i o	ᵃ ᵉ ⁱ ᵒ	ₐ ₑ ᵢ ₒ
x n	ˣ ⁿ	ₓ ₙ
+ - = ( )	⁺ ⁻ ⁼ ⁽ ⁾	₊ ₋ ₌ ₍ ₎
q C F X	no counterpart in either style — left unchanged

Example

Input	Style	Output
123	superscript	¹²³
1st	superscript	¹ˢᵗ
H2O	subscript	H₂O
C6H12O6	subscript	C₆H₁₂O₆
x2	superscript	ˣ²

Accessibility warning

These characters exist for display, not for accessibility. A screen reader may announce ² as a symbol or mispronounce it, and search engines treat ˣ² and x2 as different strings. Use them for decoration and short labels, never for content that must be read accurately.

Three ways to write a superscript, and when each is right

Unicode has precomposed superscript and subscript characters, HTML has <sup> and <sub> tags, and a rich-text document has a character property. They are not interchangeable, and choosing the wrong one is why a formula looks wrong after being pasted somewhere else.

Method	Survives pasting into…	Limitation
Unicode characters (², ₃)	Plain text, chat, filenames	Not every letter exists; digits and a few letters only
HTML tags	Web pages, Markdown with HTML	Shown literally in plain-text contexts
Rich-text property	Word, Google Docs	Lost as soon as the text is copied anywhere else

For a value that must be readable everywhere — a filename, a chat message, a database field — Unicode characters are the durable choice. For a formula in a document, the markup is correct and the Unicode approximation is a compromise.

The coverage is incomplete, on purpose

Unicode contains superscript digits ⁰¹²³⁴⁵⁶⁷⁸⁹ and a handful of letters, plus subscripts. It does not contain a full superscript alphabet: there is a superscript a and a superscript n, but no superscript q or z. A converter that appears to superscript an arbitrary word is therefore usually substituting lookalike characters or missing letters, and the result may not be searchable or accessible.

This tool converts the characters that have real Unicode superscript or subscript forms and reports the ones that do not, rather than silently dropping them. If you need arbitrary exponents, HTML markup or a math renderer is the correct tool.

Accessibility

A screen reader announces a Unicode superscript as part of the word, not as an exponent — “m²” may be read as “m squared” or as “m two” depending on the voice. The HTML tag carries the semantic meaning, so a formula that must be understood by assistive technology is better expressed with markup than with precomposed characters. That is a real trade-off against portability, and it is worth making deliberately.

Frequently asked questions

Go deeper

Longer explanations of the problems this tool solves:

Bytes, hex and entities: the same text in four notations

Sources

• Unicode Standard, Superscripts and Subscripts block (U+2070–U+209F).
• Unicode Standard, Spacing Modifier Letters and Phonetic Extensions, for the superscript Latin letters.