Unicode subscripts and superscripts

Unicode has subscripted and superscripted versions of a number of characters including a full set of Arabic numerals.

[1] These characters allow any polynomial, chemical and certain other equations to be represented in plain text without using any form of markup like HTML or TeX.

The World Wide Web Consortium and the Unicode Consortium have made recommendations on the choice between using markup and using superscript and subscript characters: When used in mathematical context (MathML) it is recommended to consistently use style markup for superscripts and subscripts […] However, when super and sub-scripts are to reflect semantic distinctions, it is easier to work with these meanings encoded in text rather than markup, for example, in phonetic or phonemic transcription.

[2]The intended use[2] when these characters were added to Unicode was to produce true superscripts and subscripts so that chemical and algebraic formulas could be written without markup.

In reality, many fonts that include these characters ignore the Unicode definition, and instead design the digits for mathematical numerator and denominator glyphs,[3][4] which are aligned with the cap line and the baseline, respectively.

The change also makes the superscript letters useful for ordinal indicators, more closely matching the ª and º characters.

*Superscript versons of Greek psi and omega have been accepted for a future version of the Unicode Standard.

Additional superscript characters for historical and para-IPA letters have been accepted for future versions of the Unicode Standard.

[11][9] Among para-IPA letters, superscript Sinological ⟨ȡ ȴ ȵ ȶ⟩ have been accepted for a future version of the Unicode Standard.

[10][9] Superscripts of the Bantuist labio-dental plosives ⟨ȹ⟩ and ⟨ȸ⟩ have been accepted for a future version of the Unicode Standard.

[16] Among para-IPA letters, Sinological superscript ⟨ɿ ʅ ʮ ʯ ⟩ have been accepted for a future version of the Unicode Standard.

Other basic Latin superscript wildcards for tone and weak indeterminate sounds, as described in the article on the International Phonetic Alphabet, are mostly supported.

In addition, a very few IPA letters beyond the basic Latin alphabet have combining forms or are supported as subscripts: Primarily for compatibility with earlier character sets, Unicode contains a number of characters that compose super- and subscripts with other symbols.