Superscript Zero

Superscript Zero at U+2070 is a raised small zero used when the zero is meant to sit above the text baseline rather than on it. It is in the Superscripts and Subscripts block, where characters provide plain-text versions of common raised and lowered digits and signs. Its most common role is in mathematical and scientific text that must remain plain text, such as exponents in notes, labels, filenames, or database fields. For example, x⁰ means “x to the zeroth power,” and many style guides define any nonzero number raised to zero as 1. It also appears in chemical, physical, and technical notation when charge states, oxidation states, isotope annotations, or unit expressions are copied as text rather than typeset with formatting. In casual writing it may be used to approximate degree-like or ordinal styling, but it is not the same character as the degree sign and should not replace it in temperatures or angles. Because superscript zero is a real character rather than formatting applied to an ordinary 0, searching, sorting, and normalization can treat it differently from a styled digit. That distinction matters when converting between plain text and professionally typeset mathematics.