What is the backslash for?

The backslash \ is mostly used in computing:

Windows paths: C:\Users\Jane\Documents;
escape sequences in strings: \n for a new line, \t for a tab, \" for a quote;
LaTeX commands: \frac{1}{2}, \section{Introduction};
regular expressions: \d for a digit, \. for a literal dot;
line continuation in shell scripts.

Pitfalls

Do not confuse it with the forward slash /, used in web addresses and in macOS and Linux paths. On a Mac, paths use /, never \.
On this layout: \. French Mac layouts have no backslash printed on the keys: ⌥ Option+⇧ Shift+:.
In some Japanese fonts the backslash is drawn as a yen sign ¥: a display issue, not a keyboard one.

\ on each layout

System	Layout	Key combination
macOS	French – Numerical	`⌥ Option`+`⇧ Shift`+`:`
macOS	French	`⌥ Option`+`⇧ Shift`+`:`
macOS	Belgian	`⌥ Option`+`⇧ Shift`+`:`
macOS	Swiss French	`⌥ Option`+`⇧ Shift`+`7`
macOS	Canadian Multilingual (CSA)	`⇧ Shift`+`/`
macOS	Canadian French	`\`
macOS	Spanish	`⌥ Option`+`º`
macOS	Latin American	`⌥ Option`+`'`
macOS	U.S.	`\`
macOS	ABC	`\`
macOS	U.S. International – PC	`\`

Other methods

Character Viewer

Press fn + E (or Control + Command + Space) to open the Character Viewer, search for “\” by name, then double-click it to insert it.

Text replacement

In System Settings › Keyboard › Text Replacements, map a shortcut (for example “;;x”) to the character \: it will be inserted automatically in most apps.

Unicode code point

U+005C

Official Unicode name

REVERSE SOLIDUS

HTML entity

\

CSS

content: "\5C";

JavaScript / JSON

"\u005C"

UTF-8 bytes

5C

URL encoding

%5C

How to type \ on a U.S. International – PC keyboard

What is the backslash for?

Pitfalls

\ on each layout

Other methods

Character Viewer

Text replacement

\ technical details

Related characters

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