symbol explained
Right Arrow
A simple rightwards arrow for flows and transitions.
- Unicode
- U+2192
- HTML entity
- →
Try Right Arrow
Edit the text, then change the font and size.
The short answer
What does Right Arrow mean?
A simple rightwards arrow for flows and transitions. Before/after notation, navigation hints and process steps.
Background
Where it comes from
The rightwards arrow is Unicode U+2192, from the Arrows block. Mathematics uses it for mappings and implication; product and interface writing borrowed it as shorthand for “becomes” or “go to”.
In conversation
How to use it
Before/after notation, navigation hints and process steps. Copy the character itself when you need plain text that can be searched, selected and pasted like a letter.
Realistic examples
Right Arrow in a sentence
“Draft → Review → Live”
“Settings → Privacy → Data”
“12 min → 4 min after the fix”
Tone & nuance
What it communicates
Efficient and directional. It compresses a whole clause about sequence or change into a single character.
Easily confused
Characters that look like →
These are separate characters. However similar they render, they sort, search and compare differently — which is why pasting the wrong one is so easy to miss.
Heavy round-tipped arrow
U+279C
A thicker dingbat arrow. It stands out in a heading where → would be too quiet.
Long rightwards arrow
U+27F6
A longer shaft, used in mathematics where the length of the arrow carries meaning.
Black right-pointing triangle
U+25B6
A solid triangle with no shaft. It reads as a play button rather than as direction.
For developers
→ in code
Each value is generated from the character itself, so it stays correct even where a file encoding cannot hold the symbol directly.
| Format | Value | When to use it | Copy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unicode | U+2192 | The standard reference. Use it to search a character map or a spec. | |
| HTML (hex) | → | For HTML and XML. Safe in files that are not saved as UTF-8. | |
| HTML (decimal) | → | The same reference in decimal. Both render identically. | |
| CSS | \2192 | For the content property. Keep the quotes around the whole value. | |
| JavaScript | \u{2192} | A string-literal escape. Needs the u flag inside a regular expression. | |
| URL-encoded | %E2%86%92 | Percent-encoded UTF-8, for query strings and API requests. |
Common questions
Right Arrow FAQ
What does the right arrow → mean?
A simple rightwards arrow for flows and transitions. Before/after notation, navigation hints and process steps.
How do I type →?
The fastest way is the copy button on this page, which puts → on the clipboard on its own, without a label or a stray space. To insert it by hand, use the code point U+2192. In HTML you can write → instead of pasting the character. Windows Character Map and the macOS Emoji & Symbols viewer both let you search for it by name.
Will → look the same everywhere?
→ is plain text, not an image, so it takes on the font, size and colour of the words around it while keeping the code point U+2192 wherever it is pasted. A font with limited coverage can substitute a different glyph or show an empty box, and some apps restyle certain symbols as coloured emoji, so preview it in the app and theme your readers will actually use.
Keep exploring