Em Dash Symbol —

— is U+2014 EM DASH. It marks a strong break, interruption, or parenthetical turn in prose, with spacing determined by the chosen style guide. Common contexts include Sentence interruptions, Parenthetical breaks, Dialogue interruptions, and attribution lines. This page covers the em dash —, not the shorter en dash –, the hyphen-minus -, or the mathematical minus sign −. Practical examples include The result—unexpected but welcome—was accepted., Wait—I can explain., and Three teams—red, blue, and green—qualified.. The main formatting priorities are: Follow one spacing convention consistently; use an en dash for numeric ranges when the style requires it; and use a hyphen for compound words, not an em dash. Avoid these common errors: Using — for every hyphen; mixing spaced and unspaced em dashes; and using — as a minus sign. Practical uses recorded for Em Dash Symbol: The result—unexpected but welcome—was accepted.; Wait—I can explain.; Three teams—red, blue, and green—qualified.; An attribution line — Author; Accessible reading: em dash. The Em Dash Symbol format checklist says: Follow one spacing convention consistently. Use an en dash for numeric ranges when the style requires it. Use a hyphen for compound words, not an em dash. Avoid strings of repeated em dashes unless the editorial style defines them. Avoid these Em Dash Symbol failures: Using — for every hyphen. Mixing spaced and unspaced em dashes. Using — as a minus sign. Typing two hyphens when a real em dash is required. Forms that must stay separate from Em Dash Symbol: – means En dash—Shorter dash used for ranges and relations; - means Hyphen-minus—ASCII hyphen and minus fallback; − means Minus sign—Mathematical subtraction sign. For Em Dash Symbol, literal UTF-8 —, decimal —, hexadecimal —, and CSS 2014 all need to preserve U+2014; verify the result at /symbols/em-dash/ in the target font.