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I've tried bashing on my keyboard with the ⌥ alt/option key pressed with the ⇧ shift key pressed but I do not seem to be able to find how I can get the euro value sign.

⇧ shift+4 gives the dollar sign: $

What keystrokes do I need to use to get the euro € sign?

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  • 1
    alt + shift + 2
    – vikramvi
    Mar 13, 2021 at 7:13

17 Answers 17

Reset to default
169

On an American English keyboard you can type the European Currency symbol (€) with Option + Shift + 2.

NOTE: It is also worth to note that specifically in Terminal, option 'Use Option as Meta Key' is turned on by default and this blocks this key combination. Please go to Terminal 'preferences', section 'Profiles' and under tab 'Keyboard' untick 'Use Option as Meta Key' checkbox to have it working.

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  • 3
    I think that it is important to note that this only works if the font you are using has the € symbol available. For instance, I am working on a customer's menu, and they designed it using AG Buch BQ, which has no € symbol in the font.
    – Gavin Anderson
    Oct 15, 2013 at 19:28
  • 2
    There are several limitations. As you said the font must have that glyph available and it works on an American English keyboard. This may work on other keyboard layouts, but I can't attest to that.
    – Ɱark Ƭ
    Oct 15, 2013 at 19:43
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    @gavin every app I know will substitute a font that does include Euro if the currently active font is missing it.
    – Tom Gewecke
    Oct 16, 2013 at 3:27
  • @Tomg, I am working in InDesign, and InDesign did not do what you are talking about for this font. Although their is some amount of font substitution possible, in a Graphic Design environment, where you are sending customer files to a printing press, messing around with the customer fonts is generally frowned upon.
    – Gavin Anderson
    Apr 29, 2014 at 19:24
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    Thanks for that info, Gavin. I didn't know that InDesign still worked this way. Kind of defeats the purpose of using the Unicode standard, but I suppose it's useful in terms of letting users know their chosen font is not adequate for their text.
    – Tom Gewecke
    Apr 30, 2014 at 14:55
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On the Euro symbol's own official home page, there's a table of keyboard shortcuts for many national keyboards: http://www.eurosymbol.eu/mac-keyboard Copied and amended here:

keyboard layout keystroke combinations
Austrian        Option-Shift-D
Belgian         Option-$
British         Option-2
Catalan         Option-U
Dutch           Option-2
Finnish         Shift-4
French          Option-$
French (num)    Option -Shift-R
German          Option-E
Italian         Option-I
Italian - Pro   Option-E
Polish          Option-3
Portuguese      Option-3
Slovakian       Option-R
Spanish         Option-U
Spanish - ISO   Option-E
Swedish         Shift-4
Swiss French    Option-E
Swiss German    Option-E
U.S.            Option-Shift-2
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  • there is no Polish layout listed any more
    – tworec
    Jul 24, 2018 at 17:30
  • OK. Do you know if Option-3 still produces a €-sign on a Polish keyboard, or has it moved? My keyboard layout, Swedish, isn't listed either, but is printed on the key, so I have no problems finding it. ;-)
    – lenborje
    Aug 10, 2018 at 9:10
  • € typed viaa Option-3 on Polish kbd right now ;)
    – tworec
    Aug 10, 2018 at 10:30
  • 6
    Should be top answer.
    – Don
    Mar 17, 2020 at 16:45
  • Correct answer.
    – joan
    Aug 3, 2022 at 6:57
50

The Euro Currency symbol is found at ⌥⇧2 on the US English keyboard.

In general, if you want to discover what symbols can be found on your keyboard when you press the modifier keys, you can use the Keyboard Viewer window.

To enable the Keyboard Viewer menu item

  1. Make sure System Preferences » Keyboard » Keyboard » Show Keyboard and Character Viewers in menu bar is checked.

Show Keyboard and Character Viewers in menu bar

  1. Make sure System Preferences » Language & Text » Input Sources » Show Input menu in menu bar is also checked.

Show Input menu in menu bar

Once you have the keyboard viewer enabled, go to the keyboard menu in your menu bar (it will look like either a picture of a keyboard or a flag representing the keyboard layout you have selected) and chose Keyboard Viewer. A window will appear with a picture of your keyboard. If you hold down the option, shift, or option and shift keys, it will show you what the keys on your keyboard do with those modifier keys pressed.

keyboard viewer

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  • Option-Shift-2 ... is that on every Mac keyboard, or just on certain ones, like Canadian English? (It also works on my US English setting.)
    – GEdgar
    Oct 14, 2013 at 13:43
  • 4
    Not universal; it works on US English and Canadian English.
    – Daniel ♦
    Oct 14, 2013 at 14:11
  • Upvote for also mentioning the Keyboard Viewer. I keep forgetting about it. € is opt+2 on UK keyboard.
    – Verena Praher
    May 5, 2016 at 8:03
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Just type alt and 2...... € just those two keys

[Edit] Tested with British & Irish, [both use alt/2] US, Canadian & British-PC [use alt/shift/2] The alternate in each case gives ™
Very similar to the British/US 'pound' symbol, swapped between shift/3 or alt/3 depending on keyboard.

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  • Why do you disagree with the other answer apple.stackexchange.com/a/105206/237
    – mmmmmm
    Sep 19, 2014 at 11:28
  • 1
    Suspect it depends on the locale you are using, what hardware keyboard you are using etc, it's not going to be the same for everyone. This one works for me, with a UK keyboard. Perhaps the other answer is using a US layout.
    – stuffe
    Sep 19, 2014 at 11:33
  • Tested with British & Irish, [both use alt/2] US, Canadian & British-PC [use alt/shift/2] The alternate in each case gives ™ Very similar to the British/US 'pound' symbol, swapped between shift/3 or alt/3 depending on keyboard.
    – Tetsujin
    Sep 19, 2014 at 14:16
  • gives me trade mark symbol: ™
    – Matiss
    Feb 5, 2021 at 9:28
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An option to use once you know how to get the € symbol is to create a text shortcut for the symbol on your Mac for faster typing. You can do this using text replacement.

To get started, follow these steps (also see image below for reference):

  1. Launch System Preferences and click on Keyboard (Language & Text on previous versions of OS X).
  2. Click on the Text tab.
  3. The Replace and With columns appear. Click on the + button at bottom-left to add a new text shortcut, which opens a text field for you to type your trigger text, for example euro.
  4. Press ⇥ tab key or mouse over to the adjacent text field (under the With column) and enter the actual € symbol. This becomes the resulting replacement text.

And you’re done. The next time you enter “euro” it will be replaced automatically with “€”. But you can always press the Esc keyboard button (to cancel the text replacement) if you actually want to type out the word “euro”.

This also works for iOS devices under Settings → General → Keyboard → Shortcuts.

Please note that this does not work automatically in every app. I’ve confirmed it works on iMessage, Notes, Reminders, Mail.

For iWork (e.g., Pages, Keynotes, Numbers) you’ll have to add the shortcuts as they use their own text replacement functionality. For example in Pages, click on the Pages menu item, then click on Auto-Correction tab, and add any text shortcuts in the same way as above. Here you can even choose to toggle (on or off) which text shortcuts you want to be active.

Keyboard Text Replacement on Mac OS X

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  • Bad idea, try to type european ...
    – Matteo
    Jan 14, 2015 at 10:57
  • Typing "european" works fine, as text replacement only works on complete words. But yes, if you often need to type "euro" as a word, then a different shortcut would be advisable... I like to start my replacement strings with a special character to minimise accidental replacements, e.g. "#euro".
    – calum_b
    Jan 12, 2016 at 15:45
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Character Viewer

The Character Viewer tool built into macOS offers the symbol you want, depending on what fonts you have installed.

To access, choose the Show Emoji & Symbols menu item in the icon menubar. May be named Character Viewer in older versions of macOS. Find the menu item next to Keyboard Viewer menu item.

If you do not see this menu amongst your icon menus, go to System Preferences > Keyboard. Check the Show Input menu in menu bar.

enter image description here

On the left, click the Currency Symbols grouping.

screenshot of Character Viewer window

Note the option to Add to Favorites on the right side. Convenient for frequent use.

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2

For Latvian keyboard layout on my mac the combination is Shift+Opt+Q.

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If you are using Polish OS X keyboard: Option ⌥ + 3

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1

If you are using Czech Mac OSX keyboard, you will find € sign under combination of ⌥ + r.

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just and addition here if you have you option key used to swap spaces this will override the keyboard shortcuts. Uncheck these options to key your true keyboard shortcuts back.

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  • Welcome to Ask Different! Instead of writing an answer to edit someone else's answer, simply click the edit or improve this answer button below the post that you wish to improve.
    – grg ♦
    Dec 28, 2013 at 17:59
0

On a Greek keyboard use alt+e

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On my Greek one is alt + shift + 2

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  • I am really curious what layout you could be using on a Mac. As far as I know, Alt ε is the standard.
    – Tom Gewecke
    Feb 2, 2016 at 1:29
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UnicodeChecker app

The free-of-cost UnicodeChecker app for macOS lets you find and copy/paste any of the over 100,000 characters defined in Unicode. This includes EURO SIGN with code point number 8,364.

This app also shows a list of fonts that include a glyph for this character.

Notice the menu item Favorites > Add Current Codepoint to Favorites…. If frequently used, you may find it convenient to add an item to the Favorites menu for this particular character.

screenshot of UnicodeChecker.app with the Euro sign selected

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-2

It's ⌥ alt+⇧+5 on my Croatian keyboard

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  • Which keyboard, though? I use the U.S. Keyboard and I get this "fi".
    – IconDaemon
    Jan 12, 2016 at 13:16
  • @IconDaemon Croatian
    – eXcaliboor
    Jan 19, 2016 at 9:14
-3

2016 new MacBook Air. Euro sign is completed by pressing Alt key & 2.

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    What does this add that hasn't already been said? It doesn't even include the nationality of the keyboard.
    – Tetsujin
    Feb 15, 2016 at 11:18
  • Totally useless answer, should be deleted.
    – Tom Gewecke
    Feb 15, 2016 at 13:44
-4

On a British Mac keyboard, type [fn]-[alt]-2 to get €

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  • That is not true - fn does not affect normal keys just the function keys - see this answer for UK keyboard alt-2
    – mmmmmm
    Jan 8, 2015 at 16:46
-4

Here's an easy way:

Just highlight and copy this: €

And then paste it into your email or whatever.

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  • You forgot the additional... find this page again, scroll down to find this post... which may make it a less than optimal long-term solution ;)
    – Tetsujin
    Sep 10, 2015 at 7:47
  • Sure, but my real point was you can just Google "Euro symbol" and copy the symbol and paste it into any app. The time it would take someone to read through and implement any of these other solutions or memorize the key command for something they seldom use, copy/paste is something that is easily remembered and implemented.
    – Team RIAB
    Sep 10, 2015 at 16:53
  • Guess it depends where you live as to how seldom that would be.
    – Tetsujin
    Sep 10, 2015 at 16:55
  • Worst answer given here. There's nothing difficult about the Keyboard Viewer & Character Viewer options given. Both employ features in every Mac & transfer to many other obscure & seldom used characters.
    – Pedro
    Jan 26, 2022 at 2:51

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