this post was submitted on 14 Jan 2026
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English is my first and only language and idk what the difference is and honestly had only learned about the emdash when it became a signifier of AI.
It's a little longer than a hyphen, right?
It's called an em dash because it's the length of a typographic em, which was supposedly originally the width of the letter m (hence the name) but is now a bit longer than that. Accordingly, an en dash is half the length of an em dash, and a hyphen is shorter than that still.
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Cool! What's the reason to use one of the three over another
The prescriptions for when you're "supposed" to use one or the other are as follows:
There are in fact even more horizontal line symbols with Unicode points than even these six.
But I myself never use en dashes: Ranges in numbers get a ~ like in CJK languages; lists get a hyphen or some other symbol; minuses are also hyphens; phone numbers get hyphens or spaces; and I can count on one hand the number of times I've had to write down a metrical foot.
I apparently have always conflated en dashes and hyphens, using what I guess is a minus sign for both: - but that looks like a hyphen to me, so is it not equivalent to the subtraction sign? The layout of my keyboard has it not just next to +/= but also the numpad where a minus should logically go . . .
The - seen on most keyboards corresponds to Unicode 002D and is known as the hyphen-minus. It does the duty of hyphen and minus as it's name suggests, and dash in some cases.
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The Venn diagram for this is absurd
Welcome to Unicode! Could we interest you in an non-breaking hyphen?
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The Unicode name for that symbol you typed is actually "hyphen-minus": it's a character created as a compromise in the early days of fixed-width typewriters, which has persisted into the present day as typewriters evolved into modern computer keyboards. The hyphen-minus is identical to a hyphen, which obviously has a separate Unicode point once again, but the hyphen-minus (as the name implies) does double duty as a minus sign as well. It's just that there is technically also a different "proper" minus sign that's a bit wider that you're "supposed" to use "if you can"… I just don't see a reason to bother with it.
I read all that and understand it, I'm pretty certain.
Still never using anything but a hyphen
Understandable
I actually wanted to say I really like your language posts even if I'm a dullard
I've been thinking of doing word of the day posts about my conlang lately, I've been writing drafts and all that.
I would read them and upbear them evennif i probably wouldn't comment
Wikipedia has a longer article on their usage: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dash
But what Erika says is the short version.
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Basically. I think it also miters differently than the standard dash/hyphen/minus sign.
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