On a standard keyboard, there is no dedicated key that you can use to type an em dash. Although an em dash looks like a combination of two or three dashes, in certain applications like gmail, pressing the dash key twice or even three times will only result in two or three individual dashes instead of combining them and creating one em dash.
In this article, I will show you seven easy ways to insert an em hyphen in gmail.
1 – use the key combination alt + 0151 (windows 10 and 11)
Step 1: Check if your keyboard has a dedicated number pad. if you don’t have one, you’ll need to connect a full-size external keyboard or separate numeric keypad.
Step 2: Click and hover in the text area of the email where you want to add the em dash.
Step 3: While holding down the alt key, use the number pad, type the number 0151, and then release the alt key. an em dash will appear where you placed the cursor.
2: use the key combination option + shift + hyphen (macos)
Step 1: Place your cursor inside the email text area where you want to insert the em dash.
Step 2: While holding down Option and the Shift key on the Apple built-in or external keyboard, press the dash (-) key. after doing this, an em dash will appear wherever you place the cursor.
3: insert em hyphen using windows emoji keyboard
Step 1: Place your cursor inside the email text area where you’d like to place the em dash.
Step 2: Right-click in the email text area. within the pop-up menu, click the word emoji.
Alternatively, you can use the shortcut keys win key + period key. either of these will open the windows emoji keyboard.
Step 3: Click on the symbols tab.
Step 4: In the Overall Score tab, the em dash is the third dash. click it to insert it into the area you specified in the email.
4: insert em dash using macos character viewer
step 1: go to the desktop of your mac.
step 2: on your keyboard, press command, control and space together or press the 🌐 key if your apple keyboard has that key.
either of these will open the character viewer window.
Step 3: Click the icon on the top right to maximize the character viewer window.
Step 4: In the search bar, type “em dash”.
Step 5: Select the em script, then click the add to favorites button.
Step 6: Click the icon on the right again to return the character viewer to its original size, then close it.
Step 7: Go back to the email you were typing in gmail and place your cursor where you want to insert the em dash.
Step 8: Right-click on that location, and in the pop-up menu, click emoji and symbols. alternatively, you can use the key combinations from step 2.
Step 9 – Below the favorites tag, click the em dash icon to add it to the desired location.
5: Copy an em dash from a unicode table and paste it into gmail email
step 1: go to this unicode table.
Step 2: In the character search bar, enter “u+2014” or “—” and then click the search icon.
Step 3: Scroll down the page, then hover your mouse over the search result in the script, then click the copy button.
step 4: go back to the email you were writing in gmail and paste the script in the location of your choice.
6: Copy an em dash from google docs and paste it into gmail email
Step 1: Open a new google doc file. press the hyphen key (-) three times in the text area, then press the space bar key. this will merge them and create a single em script.
Step 2: Highlight the em script with your mouse pointer and press control c (windows) or command c (macos) to copy it. Alternatively, you can right-click on windows or two-finger click on macos and click copy on the popup menu.
Step 3: Go back to the email you were composing or replying to in gmail and paste the script in the location of your choice.
7: Create an em script shortcut using the text replacement feature in macos
step 1: click the apple logo in the top left of your desktop, then click system preferences.
Step 2: Then click on the keyboard icon.
Step 3: Next, go to the text tab.
Step 4: Click the + icon at the bottom left.
Step 5 – In the replacement field, enter your preferred shorthand phrase that you would like to use for the em dash. I used two keystrokes of the hyphen (-) key.
Step 6: In your web browser, go to this link and copy the script.
Step 7: Place the copied em dash inside the “with” field.
Step 8: Go back to gmail and use your newly assigned passphrase to enter an em dash in your preferred location.