Greek Alphabet Chart: Letters, Names and Where They Appear

The 24 letters

Capitals run from U+0391 to U+03A9 and small letters from U+03B1 to U+03C9, each block in alphabetical order. The named entity is the WHATWG name: lowercase for the small letter, capitalized for the capital. The numeric entity is the decimal code point, which works in any HTML or XML file.

Cap	Small	Name	Cap code	Small code	Cap entity	Small entity	Numeric
Α	α	alpha	U+0391	U+03B1	Α	α	Α α
Β	β	beta	U+0392	U+03B2	Β	β	Β β
Γ	γ	gamma	U+0393	U+03B3	Γ	γ	Γ γ
Δ	δ	delta	U+0394	U+03B4	Δ	δ	Δ δ
Ε	ε	epsilon	U+0395	U+03B5	Ε	ε	Ε ε
Ζ	ζ	zeta	U+0396	U+03B6	Ζ	ζ	Ζ ζ
Η	η	eta	U+0397	U+03B7	Η	η	Η η
Θ	θ	theta	U+0398	U+03B8	Θ	θ	Θ θ
Ι	ι	iota	U+0399	U+03B9	Ι	ι	Ι ι
Κ	κ	kappa	U+039A	U+03BA	Κ	κ	Κ κ
Λ	λ	lambda	U+039B	U+03BB	Λ	λ	Λ λ
Μ	μ	mu	U+039C	U+03BC	Μ	μ	Μ μ
Ν	ν	nu	U+039D	U+03BD	Ν	ν	Ν ν
Ξ	ξ	xi	U+039E	U+03BE	Ξ	ξ	Ξ ξ
Ο	ο	omicron	U+039F	U+03BF	Ο	ο	Ο ο
Π	π	pi	U+03A0	U+03C0	Π	π	Π π
Ρ	ρ	rho	U+03A1	U+03C1	Ρ	ρ	Ρ ρ
Σ	σ	sigma	U+03A3	U+03C3	Σ	σ	Σ σ
Τ	τ	tau	U+03A4	U+03C4	Τ	τ	Τ τ
Υ	υ	upsilon	U+03A5	U+03C5	Υ	υ	Υ υ
Φ	φ	phi	U+03A6	U+03C6	Φ	φ	Φ φ
Χ	χ	chi	U+03A7	U+03C7	Χ	χ	Χ χ
Ψ	ψ	psi	U+03A8	U+03C8	Ψ	ψ	Ψ ψ
Ω	ω	omega	U+03A9	U+03C9	Ω	ω	Ω ω

Two patterns make the codes easy to remember. A small letter is always its capital plus 32 (hex 20), the same offset Latin letters use between A and a. And the capitals skip one slot: rho is U+03A1 and sigma U+03A3, a jump of 2 instead of 1, because U+03A2 is unassigned. The small letters fill that slot with the final sigma, ς at U+03C2, entity &sigmaf;, which Greek text uses for a sigma at the end of a word. Outside Greek text you will rarely need it.

Two look-alikes: µ and Ω

Two of the most used symbols exist twice in Unicode, once as a Greek letter and once as a sign inherited from older character sets.

Glyph	Character	Code	Relation	Which to use
μ	Greek small letter mu	U+03BC	The letter itself	Prose and formulas
µ	Micro sign	U+00B5	Compatibility equivalent of U+03BC	Legacy; what some keyboards insert for µ
Ω	Greek capital letter omega	U+03A9	The letter itself	Prose, formulas and the ohm
Ω	Ohm sign	U+03A9	Decomposes canonically to U+03A9	Avoid; Unicode prefers U+03A9

The Unicode notes for the ohm sign say its preferred representation is U+03A9, and the character decomposes canonically to the Greek capital omega, so any normalized text ends up with the letter anyway. The micro sign is a compatibility equivalent of the small mu, not a canonical one, which means a search for one may miss the other. For the SI prefix micro, the tables at NIST and the BIPM show the symbol as the Greek letter: 1 µm is one millionth of a meter, 10⁻⁶ m. For the ohm, the NIST guide to the SI gives the symbol Ω and the definition one volt per ampere. If a page mixes the two characters, the find and replace tool can unify them, since the two code points are distinct strings.

Where the letters appear

The last column of the chart lists the conventional uses. Only two are fixed by a standard: µ as the SI prefix for 10⁻⁶ and Ω as the unit symbol for electric resistance. The rest are conventions that vary by field and by author, so a textbook defines each symbol where it first uses it; the uses listed are the ones you will meet most often.

π (pi, U+03C0) is the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter, 3.14159…, and the Unicode names list itself annotates the character with that value. The scientific calculator has it on a key, together with the trigonometric functions that take angles in degrees or radians, where a full turn is 2π radians.
Σ (capital sigma) in front of an expression means add the terms up; Π (capital pi) means multiply them. The small σ is the usual symbol for a standard deviation and σ² for a variance.
Δ (capital delta) marks a change or difference, as in Δt for an elapsed time; the small δ is a small change, and ε a small positive number in the definition of a limit.
θ and φ are the default names for angles, λ for a wavelength, ν for a frequency, ω for an angular frequency, ρ for a density, τ for a time constant or a torque.
α, β and γ are the first three letters and so the default names for the three angles of a triangle, and in statistics α is the significance level and β the coefficients of a regression.

Typing and encoding Greek letters

In HTML. Use the named entity from the chart, π for π or Ω for Ω, or the numeric one. On a UTF-8 page the character itself is fine; the HTML entity converter turns a pasted Greek word into entities when the file encoding is uncertain, and decodes entities back to text.
As styled text. The fancy text generator maps Latin letters to the mathematical bold, italic and script alphabets that Unicode provides; those are separate code points too, not fonts. Greek letters are their own block and are not restyled versions of Latin ones, so an alpha pasted into a bio is still U+03B1.
In a calculator or a formula. Type the letter where the software accepts Unicode input; otherwise most programs spell the name, pi or sigma, which is what the chart's Name column is for.

One check before you publish a formula: look at the code points, not the shapes. A µ copied from a keyboard layout is often U+00B5, an Ω copied from a unit list may be U+2126, and a Latin capital A, B, E, H, I, K, M, N, O, P, T, X, Y or Z looks the same as its Greek capital in most fonts. The entity converter shows the numeric code of every character you paste, which settles the question.

Frequently asked questions

How many letters are in the Greek alphabet?

Twenty-four, from alpha to omega, each with a capital and a small form. Unicode encodes the capitals from U+0391 to U+03A9 and the small letters from U+03B1 to U+03C9, with one extra small letter, the final sigma ς at U+03C2, used at the end of a word in Greek text.

Why is there a gap at U+03A2?

Because the small letters have 25 forms and the capitals only 24. The small sigma has two shapes, σ inside a word and ς at the end, and Unicode gives the final form its own code point at U+03C2. The capital block mirrors the small block slot for slot, so the position that would correspond to a capital final sigma, U+03A2, is left unassigned.

Is the micro sign the same as the Greek letter mu?

They are two code points that usually look identical. The micro sign µ is U+00B5, inherited from the Latin-1 character set, and the Greek small letter mu μ is U+03BC. Unicode records U+00B5 as a compatibility equivalent of U+03BC. For the SI prefix micro the symbol in the NIST and BIPM tables is the Greek letter, and in practice either character renders as the same glyph; searching text may treat them as different.

Is the ohm sign different from capital omega?

Unicode has a separate ohm sign at U+2126, but its character notes say the preferred representation is U+03A9, the Greek capital letter omega, and the ohm sign decomposes canonically to it. So write the unit symbol with the Greek letter Ω. The NIST guide to the SI lists the ohm, symbol Ω, as the unit of electric resistance, equal to one volt per ampere.

How do I type Greek letters in HTML?

Each letter has a named character reference in the WHATWG list: the lowercase name for the small letter, such as α or π, and the capitalized name for the capital, such as Δ or Ω. The final sigma is &sigmaf;. Numeric references work too, π for π, and on a UTF-8 page you can type the characters directly.

What is pi?

The ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter, a constant whose decimal expansion starts 3.14159. The Unicode names list annotates the small letter pi, U+03C0, with that value, and a scientific calculator has it on a key so you do not have to type the digits.

Sources

Written by Tobias. Updated October 24, 2026.