About Cloud
Cloud is the Unicode character ☁ at codepoint U+2601 in the Miscellaneous Symbols block of the Basic Multilingual Plane (BMP).
Reference
A line-drawn cloud from Unicode's small meteorological set, and one of the characters that sits on the boundary between text and emoji. U+2601 is So in Miscellaneous Symbols, present since Unicode 1.1 (1993), with the chart alias "cloudy weather". It carries the Emoji property but not Emoji_Presentation, which means the bare character defaults to a monochrome text glyph; Unicode's own emoji data lists the bare form as unqualified and the sequence U+2601 U+FE0F as fully qualified under the short name "cloud". Both variation sequences are defined, so U+FE0E forces text and U+FE0F forces emoji. Line break class is ID, so a line may break after it as though it were an ideograph.
Typical uses
- Weather notation, which is what the block encoded it for
- The computing sense of "the cloud" — hosting, storage, anything remote
- A monochrome ornament, where the text form is wanted and the emoji form is not
At a glance
- U+2601, Miscellaneous Symbols; Unicode 1.1 (1993); general category So
- Chart alias: cloudy weather
- Emoji property yes, Emoji_Presentation no — the default is text
- U+2601 U+FE0F is the fully qualified emoji sequence; U+2601 U+FE0E forces the text form
- East Asian Width Neutral; line break class ID; no HTML named entity
Historical Notes
Origins
Weather glyphs on forecasts and almanacs are older than any character set, and the shape is not attributable to a person. The encoding history is what can be checked.
Unicode
Present since Unicode 1.1, released in 1993, in Miscellaneous Symbols, in a short meteorological run that also holds a sun, an umbrella, a snowman and a comet. The chart gives one alias, "cloudy weather", and no usage note.
The emoji arrived without changing the default
When emoji were unified into Unicode, this character gained emoji behaviour rather than being replaced by a new one. The way the standard records that is precise: the character is listed as Emoji, it is not listed as Emoji_Presentation, and both variation sequences are defined for it. Two hundred and nineteen codepoints across the whole standard are in exactly that position — emoji-capable and text by default — and all 219 accept a variation selector. A further 152 characters default to emoji and accept U+FE0E to force text, for 371 in total. The cloud is on the older side of that line, which is why a lone one so often renders as flat outline where a coloured puff was expected.
Developer Notes
| Unicode Codepoint | |
| Decimal | |
| UTF-8 (hex) | |
| UTF-16 (hex) | |
| HEX Entity | |
| HTML Entity | |
| CSS (\xxxx) | |
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| Python |
How to Use Cloud
To use the Cloud symbol (☁) in HTML, insert the
entity ☁ directly into your markup. The decimal entity ☁ works in any HTML-serialised document.
In CSS pseudo-elements use content: '\2601';.
In JavaScript and TypeScript the escape '\u2601' evaluates to ☁. In Python source, write '\u2601'.
The character encodes to E2 98 81 as UTF-8 bytes and 2601 as UTF-16 code units. Its decimal codepoint is 9729.
This is a text-based Unicode character. It will render in the current font on most platforms. If a font lacks this glyph, the browser may show a placeholder or fall back to a system font.
Things to know
- The bare character defaults to text presentation. If you want the coloured cloud, write U+2601 U+FE0F; Unicode's emoji data calls the bare form unqualified.
- U+FE0E goes the other way and forces the monochrome form, which is useful when the character is being used as a typographic mark.
- The variation selector is invisible and easily lost. Copy a coloured cloud through a field that strips it and the glyph silently changes shape.
- No named HTML entity. Write ☁ or ☁.
- Line break class ID, so a line may break after it as it would after a CJK ideograph — worth knowing if it sits inside a phrase you did not want split.
- East Asian Width Neutral, so it does not take a full-width cell the way several of its neighbours do.
In the Wild
On 5 August 2026 Wikipedia's Miscellaneous Symbols article carried the character five times: two code-chart cells and three in its own table of default presentations, which sets the bare character, the character plus U+FE0E and the character plus U+FE0F side by side. The article demonstrates the mechanism rather than using the glyph.
The occurrence outside a chart is the informative one. A large open-source list of Go projects describes a tool that reports cloud spending, and writes the character as the fully qualified sequence, with U+FE0F. That is the rule working as intended: where an author wanted the coloured cloud, the selector is there.
Pages change; this is what those showed on the day.
FAQ
Why does it sometimes look like a plain outline?
Because that is its default. The character carries the Emoji property but not Emoji_Presentation, so without U+FE0F after it a conforming renderer shows the text form.
How do I force the coloured version?
Follow it with U+FE0F. That sequence is what Unicode lists as fully qualified.
Is it the rain cloud?
No. The rain, lightning and sun-behind-cloud variants are separate characters. This is the bare cloud.
Is there an HTML entity?
No named one. Use ☁ or ☁.