Diaeresis and umlaut: same dots, different roles

Uses and scope

German ä, ö and ü are umlaut vowel letters. A French diaeresis can separate the interpretation of neighbouring vowels, as in Noël. Spanish ü makes u pronounced in güe and güi. Pinyin ü is a distinct vowel spelling and may also carry a tone mark. The shared shape does not give all these letters the same pronunciation or grammatical function. [22], [18], [20], [48], [49], [32], [3]

Similar shapes, different characters

Do not replace Hungarian ő or ű with ö or ü: double acute is a different mark. The spacing diaeresis ¨ beside a vowel is not canonically equivalent to the accented vowel. Greek dialytika uses the same combining mark on Greek letters. Historical and foreign-name spellings must be labelled by their own conventions rather than treated as a universal umlaut system. [1], [2], [22], [18], [20], [48], [49], [32], [3]

Typing and text forms

Copying is exact; preview circles are excluded. Compare normalization forms.

Word for Windows

Select a hex code, then Alt+X; repeat for each scalar.

Mac and mobile

Hold a letter for supported variants; use Character Viewer on Mac or a language keyboard on mobile.

HTML

Use UTF-8 text or the numeric references in Details, in order.

Full typing instructions ·HTML, CSS and JavaScript entry ·Verified Alt codes.

Sources and method

Usage statements link to the authority that supports their scope. Character names, categories, combining classes and normalization results come from the pinned Unicode data. A canonical decomposition does not establish language membership or spelling frequency.

Source access date: 2026-09-14.

• [4] Unicode combining mark names and annotations. Names, cross references and narrowly attributed usage annotations. Historical annotations are not automatically current recommendations.
• [22] Council for German Orthography: official rules, 2024. German vowel letters, umlaut spelling, sharp s and capitalization.
• [18] Académie française: tréma. French diaeresis and the scope of the 1990 spelling rectifications.
• [20] RAE and ASALE: diéresis. Modern güe and güi, capitals, historical and poetic uses.
• [48] Chinese Ministry of Education: GB/T 16159, 2012. Hanyu Pinyin orthography, vowel tone marks and neutral tone; this is romanization, not added marks on Han characters.
• [49] Henan Normal University: reproduced Pinyin spelling standard. Readable university reproduction of GB/T 16159-2012; section on tone placement and unmarked neutral tone. Used alongside the official Ministry PDF.
• [32] Hungarian Academy: spelling rules, twelfth edition. Hungarian vowel letters, accents and alphabetic ordering.
• [3] Unicode 17: Latin, Greek and combining marks. Sections 7.1, 7.2, 7.8 and 7.9: encoded distinctions, script conventions and glyph variation, not a complete orthography.
• [1] Unicode Character Database 17.0.0.
• [2] Unicode normalization, UAX #15.
• [10] Microsoft: Unicode character entry in Word.
• [11] Apple: enter characters with accent marks.
• [12] Google: use Gboard.
• [13] Unicode: fonts and keyboards FAQ.
• [14] HTML numeric character references.

Read the editorial method and inspect the underlying datasets.