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Katakana

U+30A0 – U+30FF   (12448–12543)

Katakana is a kana (Japanese syllabic writing system), used in modern Japanese mainly for words of foreign origin and for emphasis. The characters are more angular than those of Hiragana, another kana that is used mainly for writing grammatical morphemes. Historical characters can be found in the Kana Supplement range. You can find some real (non-Unicode) Japanese text to try at http://www.microsoft.com/japan/, Asahi.com and http://www.apple.co.jp/. You can see some Unicode Japanese on the What is Unicode? in Japanese page. There are some related characters in the Katakana Phonetic Extensions range.

Users of Internet Explorer 5 for Windows can choose to install updates for viewing Japanese Web pages and to provide a Japanese interface and a Japanese IME.

Users of Macintosh computers running Mac OS 9 can install an Apple Language Kit for Japanese, which includes an IME.

The characters that appear in the first column of the following table depend on the browser that you are using, the fonts installed on your computer, and the browser options you have chosen that determine the fonts used to display particular character sets, encodings or languages.

You can find some or all of the characters in this range in the Windows Unicode fonts ALPHABETUM Unicode, AR PL ShanHeiSun Uni, AR PL ZenKai Uni, Arial Unicode MS, BabelStone Han, Baekmuk Batang, Baekmuk Dotum, Baekmuk Gulim, Baekmuk Headline, Batang, BatangChe, Caslon, Chrysanthi Unicode, Code2000, Free Idg Serif, Gulim Che, Gungsuh, GungsuhChe, HAN NOM A, HanaMin Regular, HY Shin Myeongjo Std Acro, Kochi Gothic, Kochi Mincho, Kozuka Mincho Pro Acro, Malgun Gothic, Ming(for ISO10646), MingLiU, MingLiU_HKSCS, MS Gothic, MS Hei, MS Mincho, MS PGothic, MS PMincho, MS Song, MS UI Gothic, MSung Std Acro, New Gulim, NSimSun, NSimSun-18030, PMingLiU, Roman Unicode, Sazanami Gothic, Sazanami Mincho, SimHei, SimSun, SimSun-18030, STSong Std Acro, Sun-ExtA, TITUS Cyberbit Basic, TSC JSong S TT, UnBatang, WenQuanYi Zen Hei, WenQuanYi Zen Hei Mono, and YOzFontN; in the Macintosh OS 9 Unicode fonts AppleGothic, AppleMyungjo, Beijing, ChuGothic, Fang Song, Gungseouche, Hei, HeiseiKakuGothic, HeiseiMincho, Kai, Osaka, Osaka-Mono, Pilgiche, SaiMincho, Seoul and Song; and in the Macintosh OS X Unicode fonts AppleGothic, AppleMyungjo, Batang, Beijing, Fang Song, #GothicMedium, Gulim, #GungSeo, Hangang, Hei, Hiragino Kaku Gothic Pro, Hiragino Kaku Gothic Std, Hiragino Maru Gothic Pro, Hiragino Mincho Pro, Kai, MS Gothic, MS Mincho, MS PGothic, MS PMincho, #MyungjoNeue, Osaka, Osaka-Mono, #PCMyungjo, #PilGi, PMingLiU, Seoul, SimSun, Song, STFangsong, STHeiti, STKaiti, STSong and #TaeGraphic.

To see exactly which characters are included in a particular font, you can use a utility such as Andrew West’s BabelMap, Apple’s TrueEdit, or WunderMoosen’s FontChecker.

If you are not familiar with the characters, you can check the characters displayed here with the graphical display at http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U30A0.pdf.

Character
(decimal)
DecimalCharacter
(hex)
HexName
1244830A0KATAKANA-HIRAGANA DOUBLE HYPHEN
1244930A1KATAKANA LETTER SMALL A
1245030A2KATAKANA LETTER A
1245130A3KATAKANA LETTER SMALL I
1245230A4KATAKANA LETTER I
1245330A5KATAKANA LETTER SMALL U
1245430A6KATAKANA LETTER U
1245530A7KATAKANA LETTER SMALL E
1245630A8KATAKANA LETTER E
1245730A9KATAKANA LETTER SMALL O
1245830AAKATAKANA LETTER O
1245930ABKATAKANA LETTER KA
1246030ACKATAKANA LETTER GA
1246130ADKATAKANA LETTER KI
1246230AEKATAKANA LETTER GI
1246330AFKATAKANA LETTER KU
1246430B0KATAKANA LETTER GU
1246530B1KATAKANA LETTER KE
1246630B2KATAKANA LETTER GE
1246730B3KATAKANA LETTER KO
1246830B4KATAKANA LETTER GO
1246930B5KATAKANA LETTER SA
1247030B6KATAKANA LETTER ZA
1247130B7KATAKANA LETTER SI
1247230B8KATAKANA LETTER ZI
1247330B9KATAKANA LETTER SU
1247430BAKATAKANA LETTER ZU
1247530BBKATAKANA LETTER SE
1247630BCKATAKANA LETTER ZE
1247730BDKATAKANA LETTER SO
1247830BEKATAKANA LETTER ZO
1247930BFKATAKANA LETTER TA
1248030C0KATAKANA LETTER DA
1248130C1KATAKANA LETTER TI
1248230C2KATAKANA LETTER DI
1248330C3KATAKANA LETTER SMALL TU
1248430C4KATAKANA LETTER TU
1248530C5KATAKANA LETTER DU
1248630C6KATAKANA LETTER TE
1248730C7KATAKANA LETTER DE
1248830C8KATAKANA LETTER TO
1248930C9KATAKANA LETTER DO
1249030CAKATAKANA LETTER NA
1249130CBKATAKANA LETTER NI
1249230CCKATAKANA LETTER NU
1249330CDKATAKANA LETTER NE
1249430CEKATAKANA LETTER NO
1249530CFKATAKANA LETTER HA
1249630D0KATAKANA LETTER BA
1249730D1KATAKANA LETTER PA
1249830D2KATAKANA LETTER HI
1249930D3KATAKANA LETTER BI
1250030D4KATAKANA LETTER PI
1250130D5KATAKANA LETTER HU
1250230D6KATAKANA LETTER BU
1250330D7KATAKANA LETTER PU
1250430D8KATAKANA LETTER HE
1250530D9KATAKANA LETTER BE
1250630DAKATAKANA LETTER PE
1250730DBKATAKANA LETTER HO
1250830DCKATAKANA LETTER BO
1250930DDKATAKANA LETTER PO
1251030DEKATAKANA LETTER MA
1251130DFKATAKANA LETTER MI
1251230E0KATAKANA LETTER MU
1251330E1KATAKANA LETTER ME
1251430E2KATAKANA LETTER MO
1251530E3KATAKANA LETTER SMALL YA
1251630E4KATAKANA LETTER YA
1251730E5KATAKANA LETTER SMALL YU
1251830E6KATAKANA LETTER YU
1251930E7KATAKANA LETTER SMALL YO
1252030E8KATAKANA LETTER YO
1252130E9KATAKANA LETTER RA
1252230EAKATAKANA LETTER RI
1252330EBKATAKANA LETTER RU
1252430ECKATAKANA LETTER RE
1252530EDKATAKANA LETTER RO
1252630EEKATAKANA LETTER SMALL WA
1252730EFKATAKANA LETTER WA
1252830F0KATAKANA LETTER WI
1252930F1KATAKANA LETTER WE
1253030F2KATAKANA LETTER WO
1253130F3KATAKANA LETTER N
1253230F4KATAKANA LETTER VU
1253330F5KATAKANA LETTER SMALL KA
1253430F6KATAKANA LETTER SMALL KE
1253530F7KATAKANA LETTER VA
1253630F8KATAKANA LETTER VI
1253730F9KATAKANA LETTER VE
1253830FAKATAKANA LETTER VO
1253930FBKATAKANA MIDDLE DOT
1254030FCKATAKANA-HIRAGANA PROLONGED SOUND MARK
1254130FDKATAKANA ITERATION MARK
1254230FEKATAKANA VOICED ITERATION MARK
1254330FFKATAKANA DIGRAPH KOTO

Copyright © 1999–2010 Alan Wood

The hexadecimal numbers and the character names in the above table are taken from the Unicode 3.2 Character Database, Copyright © 1991–2002 Unicode, Inc., as contained in UnicodeData.txt on the Unicode Web site (http://www.unicode.org/Public/UNIDATA/) in April 2002.

Created 3rd February 1999   Last updated 7th November 2010

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