Alright, let me tell you about figuring out the copyright symbol thing on my Mac the other day. I was putting together some notes, maybe for a little project description or something, and thought, “Hey, I should probably put a copyright symbol down here.”
So, naturally, I first just stared at my keyboard. You know how it is, looking for that little © symbol somewhere. Checked the number keys with Shift, tried a few random Command key combos. Nothing jumped out. It’s not like the dollar sign or percent sign that are right there.
I figured there had to be an easy way. Macs usually have neat little shortcuts for these things. I poked around a bit, tried a few common sense key combinations.
Finding the Shortcut
After a moment or two, I stumbled upon the actual keyboard shortcut. Turns out, it’s pretty straightforward once you know it. You just need to hold down one key and press another.
- Hold down the Option key (sometimes called Alt on some keyboards).
- While holding Option, just press the letter G.
And boom! The © symbol popped right onto my screen. Tried it a couple of times to make sure. Yep, Option + G. That was it. Super simple.
Another Way: The Character Viewer
While I was at it, I also realized there’s the more visual way too, which is handy if you forget the shortcut or need some other weird symbol. Macs have that thing called the Character Viewer (or sometimes it shows up as ‘Emoji & Symbols’ in menus, like under ‘Edit’).
You bring that little window up, and it’s got everything. I just typed “copyright” into its search bar, and there it was. You can also browse through the symbol categories, like ‘Symbols’ -> ‘Letterlike Symbols’ or something similar, and find it visually. Once you find ©, you just double-click it, and it inserts it wherever your cursor is.
So yeah, two ways to do it. Honestly, I’ll probably just stick to the Option + G shortcut now that I know it because it’s quick. But the Character Viewer is good to remember for other symbols too. Pretty easy stuff once you find it out.
