Technical Symbols
The symbols on and around your keyboard: ⌘ command, ⌥ option, ⇧ shift and ⏎ return, the media and power controls from play to standby, the printable control pictures, and the rest of the Unicode technical block including APL and bracket pieces. Click any symbol to copy it.
The Mac key symbols date back to early Apple keyboards and still appear in every macOS menu. The control pictures are stand-ins that let you show invisible characters like null, escape and delete in visible print.
Mac & keyboard keys 19
Media, time & power 22
Control pictures 39
More technical symbols 220
Where the ⌘ command symbol comes from
The looped square on the Mac command key has a name far older than computing. It is a version of the Bowen knot, and across Scandinavia it has long marked a point of interest on maps and road signs, pointing the way to anything from a castle to a campsite.
The story goes that an early Apple team had filled the first Mac menus with too many little apple logos. Steve Jobs objected to seeing the company symbol worn out by overuse, so the designer Susan Kare went looking through a dictionary of symbols for a replacement and settled on this one. It has marked the command key ever since.
The neighbouring keys follow older habits. The option, shift and control symbols were borrowed from typewriters and early computer terminals, and Unicode gathered them all up so that any font could print a keyboard shortcut in writing rather than leaving a blank.