In symbol world, hourglass is an Unicode emoji symbol you can insert on documents and chat conversations. It contains all the sand in the bottom part of the glass with a symbol name as “Hourglass Done”. There is a separate symbol for indicating hourglass with flowing sand with the name as “Hourglass Not Done”. You can use alt code shortcuts or default utilities in Windows and Mac to insert these hourglass symbols.
Summary of Hourglass Symbols Shortcuts
Here is summary of shortcuts for inserting hourglass symbol on Windows, Mac and HTML documents.
| Symbol Name | Hourglass Done | Hourglass with Flowing Sand |
| Category | Emoji | Emoji |
| Alt Code (Windows) | Alt 8987 | Alt 9203 |
| Alt + X (Word) | 231B Alt X | 23F3 Alt X |
| Option Code (Mac) | Option 231B | Option 23F3 |
| Skype Emoticons | (holdon) (hourglass) | |
| HTML Entity Decimal | ⌛ | &# 9203 |
| HTML Entity Hexadecimal | ⌛ | &#x 23F3 |
| CSS Value | \231B | \23F3 |
| JavaScript Value | \u231B | \u23F3 |
| Decimal | 8987 | 9203 |
| Hexadecimal | 231B | 23F3 |
| Unicode Point | U+231B | U+23F3 |
How to Insert Hourglass Symbols?
There is no standard keyboard key available for inserting hourglass symbols. You need to use the keyboard shortcuts as mentioned in the above table.
Insert Hourglass Symbols in Windows
- On Windows based documents, press and hold one of the alt keys and type 8987 using number pad to make hourglass symbol ⌛️.
- Alternatively, you can type 231B then press alt and x keys on Microsoft Word documents.
Insert Hourglass Symbols in Mac
- On Mac based documents like Pages, press option key and type 23F3 to make hourglass with flowing sand symbol. However, you need to change the input method to Unicode Hex Input to use Unicode hexadecimal values on Mac.
- Alternatively, press “Control + Command + Spacebar” to open Character Viewer app. Type “hourglass” in the search box to filter the relevant symbols. Now, you will see all hourglass symbols and double click to insert on your document.
As you can see, there are few more hourglass symbols on the Character Viewer. We will explain the other hourglass symbols in the below section.
On HTML and Web Documents
- You can use either decimal or hexadecimal escape strings in HTML documents. The decimal escape code for hourglass symbol in HTML is &# 8987; and hexadecimal escape code is &#x 231B; 9use without spaces).
- On CSS and JavaScript documents, use the hexadecimal code in the format \231B and \u231B respectively. Below is an example CSS code you can use hourglass symbol before list element.
li:before {
content:\231B;
}
- In modern web design, it is popular to use font icons like Font Awesome instead of Unicode symbols. Font Awesome icons have their own Unicode point and you can easily insert the icons on your websites by adding a piece of HTML code.
Hourglass Emoji Symbols Display
Different applications and browsers will display the hourglass symbol in different manner.
| Application | Hourglass Done | Hourglass Not Done |
| Browser | ⌛️ | ⏳ |
| Windows |  |  |
 |  | |
| Apple |  |  |
 |  | |
 |  | |
| Skype |  |
Black and White Hourglass
In addition to hourglass done and hourglass with flowing sand emojis, Unicode has also two other hourglass symbols. They are black and white hourglass symbols identified under bowtie symbols. Unlike emojis, you can adjust the formatting and colors of these two symbols as they are line symbols.
- You can insert black hourglass ⧗ symbol using alt + 10711 on Windows and option + 29D7 on Mac.
- Similarly, you can insert white hourglass ⧖ symbol using alt + 10710 on Windows and option + 29D6 on Mac.
Symbol Variations
Hourglass Done is an emoji, therefore you can’t adjust the color of the symbol. However, you can increase or decrease the size like any other text content, apply shadow and change the background. On other hand, you can decorate the black and white hourglass symbols easily.
⧗
⧖
⌛
Hourglass Usage
In earlier days before the invention of clocks, people use hourglass to estimate the time. Even nowadays, you can see many uses of hourglass to map the clock timing. For example, many popular restaurants keep the hourglass on the table to indicate the delivery of the ordered food will be done before the completion of the sand fall. The sand fall time will be around 15 to 20 minutes depending upon the case.
