# How to typeset the symbol “^” (caret/circumflex/hat)

I need to display the symbol '^'

d <- dist(fascores, method = "euclidean")^2


How do I do that?

• Answers from How to look up a symbol are valid in this case. However, there are more options for circumflex than for most symbols ;)
– yo'
Feb 25, 2013 at 8:01
• Jun 13 at 1:37

You can use

• in text-mode (needs \textrm or similar in math-mode)
• \textasciicircum or
• \^{},
• in math-mode
• \hat{} (only this produces a circumflex),
• \widehat{}, or
• \wedge (∧).
• in a verb-like manner

• \string^,
• \char\^,
• \verb!^!:

\verb!d <- dist(fascores, method = "euclidean")^2!


## Overview

### Code

\documentclass{standalone}
\usepackage{upquote}% getting the right grave  (and not ‘)!
\begin{document}
\begin{tabular}{lcc}
Input                   &       Text       &                 Math                  \\ \hline
\verb|\string^|         &     \string^     &              $\string^$               \\
\verb|\char\^|         &     \char\^     &              $\char\^$               \\
\verb|\verb!^!|         &     \verb!^!     &              $\verb!^!$               \\ \hline
\verb|\textasciicircum| & \textasciicircum &                  ---                  \\
\verb|\^{}|             & \^{} (e.g. \^a)  &                  ---                  \\ \hline
\verb|\hat{}|           &       ---        &       $\hat{}$ (e.g. $\hat a$)        \\
\verb|\wedge|           &       ---        &      $\wedge$ (e.g. $a\wedge b$)      \\
\verb|\widehat{}|       &       ---        & $\widehat{\ }$ (e.g. $\widehat{abc}$) \\
\end{tabular}
\end{document}


## Output

• As for me, in math-mode the best appearance has sequence ^\wedge. Other variants is mostly to small. Nov 3, 2014 at 12:06
• I have accented letters, but not the symbols ^ and  on my keyboard. Is there an easy way to input them without switching keyboard (or copy-pasting the symbols from wikipedia)? Mar 24, 2017 at 14:51
• we aslo have $\land$= \land in math mode Jul 27, 2018 at 16:47
• What is the documentclass standalone? Apr 17, 2020 at 14:46

You could also try \textsuperscript{$\wedge$} which yields:

To put this into context, (\textsuperscript{$\wedge$}N225), will yield:

• Or, simply, $^\wedge$ Sep 24, 2020 at 23:27

For those of you trying to do the ^^ smiley, here is a comparison of various methods (the first is \textsuperscript, the second is \^, the third is a scaled version of \wedge in superscript, and the last one is the second solution stretched on the y axis, with some fine tuning to have a better spacing: therefore it may need some tuning if you use different fonts):

Compare
\textasciicircum{}\textasciicircum{}
with
\^{}\^{}
or
\scalebox{.8}{\textsuperscript{$\wedge\wedge$}}
or the configurable % change the value in raisebox and in kern to change the spacing and the optional argument of scalebox to change the x/y ratio.
\raisebox{0pt}[\height][0pt]{\raisebox{-1.7ex}{\scalebox{1}[2]{\^{}\kern-.05em\^{}}}}.