Superscript Generator
Convert ordinary text into paste-ready Unicode superscript characters, with a companion subscript result and clear fallback for characters that Unicode does not provide.
Text to convert
Required. Up to 2,000 Unicode code points. Unsupported characters remain unchanged rather than being approximated.
Live results
Superscript result
q² ⁺ ᴴ²ᴼ
Subscript result
q₂ ₊ ₕ₂ₒ
Superscript generated. 5 of 8 characters were replaced by Unicode superscript characters.
How to use this superscript generator
What this calculator does. This tool performs a character-by-character Unicode conversion. It looks at each code point in Enter text to convert, replaces it with a known superscript character when one exists, and leaves it unchanged when there is no faithful mapped character. It simultaneously creates a companion subscript version. The result is plain Unicode text, not HTML styling, so the raised or lowered characters are part of the text itself. The Unicode Superscripts and Subscripts code chart shows the dedicated U+2070 – U+209F block; additional modifier letters used for raised text live in other Unicode blocks.
When to use it. Use the superscript result for short plain-text exponents, compact unit notation, footnote-like markers, or snippets that must survive copying into a field that does not preserve rich-text formatting. Use the subscript companion for compact chemical or indexed notation such as H₂O or x₁ when a matching Unicode character exists. For formal mathematics, complex nested expressions, or professionally typeset documents, semantic markup or an equation editor is usually the better tool because Unicode does not provide a complete raised or lowered alphabet.
How to calculate. The calculator opens with the ready-to-use demonstration text q2 + H2O, so both results and the XLSX export are available immediately.
- Replace the demonstration text in Enter text to convert with the word, formula fragment, number, or short phrase you want to transform. Results update as you type.
- Read Superscript result for the raised Unicode version and Subscript result for the lowered companion. Any unsupported source character stays visibly unchanged.
- Use Characters, Superscript mapped, and Subscript mapped to check how much of the input was actually replaced. Spaces and unsupported characters count as unchanged.
- Select Download Excel to export the current source text, both converted results, counts, and coverage percentages to a real XLSX workbook. Reset clears the demonstration and all calculated output; Excel export is disabled until you enter complete valid text again.
Input guide. Enter text to convert is the only required input. It accepts Unicode text, including letters, digits, spaces, punctuation, and line breaks, up to 2,000 code points. A realistic input is q2 + H2O. Adding supported digits or signs normally increases the mapped counts; adding unsupported characters leaves those characters unchanged in the corresponding result. The most common mistake is assuming this tool applies font formatting to arbitrary text. It does not: it substitutes individual Unicode characters, so visual coverage depends on what Unicode has encoded and what the reader's font can display.
Output guide. Superscript result is the exact substitution result for the raised mapping, while Subscript result applies the lowered mapping. Characters is the source code-point count. Superscript mapped and Subscript mapped count positions whose character changed. A zero mapped count means the input contains no characters in that mapping; a high count means most source positions have direct replacements. These are exact string transformations and counts for the implemented mapping, not measurements or recommendations. Unicode support is intentionally incomplete, and the Unicode Consortium's guidance on why Unicode does not provide a complete superscript and subscript alphabet explains why character encoding and typographic markup are not interchangeable in every context.
Worked example. With the startup text q2 + H2O, the eight source characters are q, 2, space, +, space, H, 2, and O. The superscript mapping leaves q and both spaces unchanged, while it replaces 2 with ², + with ⁺, H with ᴴ, the second 2 with ², and O with ᴼ. The first-open Superscript result is therefore q² ⁺ ᴴ²ᴼ, with 5 mapped characters out of 8. The subscript mapping similarly produces q₂ ₊ ₕ₂ₒ and maps 5 of the 8 source positions.
Unicode characters versus text formatting
Unicode superscripts and subscripts are individual characters. That makes them useful in plain-text environments where a formatting span would be lost, but it also means coverage is limited to the characters that have actually been encoded. A word processor can visually raise or lower almost any selected text because it stores formatting separately from the letters. If you are preparing a Word document rather than portable plain text, Microsoft documents the native superscript and subscript formatting controls in Word.
Interpreting unchanged characters
An unchanged character is not a calculation error. It means the mapping does not have a faithful dedicated Unicode substitute for that source character. This is especially common for subscript letters and for punctuation beyond the basic plus, minus, equals, and parentheses set. Keeping the original character is safer than silently substituting a visually similar but semantically different symbol. Font coverage can also affect appearance: a valid Unicode character may render differently across fonts or devices, and a missing glyph can appear as an empty box even though the code point itself is valid.