Quick Answer
On a US Windows or Mac keyboard, press Shift + 2 to type the at sign. On a UK Windows keyboard the shortcut is Shift + apostrophe, and on a UK Mac it is Option + 2.
On German, Spanish, and many European layouts, use AltGr + Q or AltGr + 2. On phones, tap the 123 key and the at sign sits on the main punctuation page.
The fast reference table
- US keyboard (Windows or Mac): Shift + 2
- UK keyboard (Windows): Shift + apostrophe (next to Enter)
- UK keyboard (Mac): Option + 2
- Spanish Latin America: AltGr + Q
- Spanish Spain: AltGr + 2
- German and Austrian: AltGr + Q
- French AZERTY: AltGr + the accent grave key
- Windows fallback: Alt + 64 on the numeric keypad
Why the at sign feels different on every machine
The at character anchors every email address and every social handle, yet the key it lives on moves around the world. The reason is layout history. The US ANSI layout puts it on the 2 key, the UK and Irish layouts move the apostrophe and the at sign because of the British pound, and continental European layouts hide it under AltGr to make room for accented characters.
Windows
US layout
The simplest case. Hold Shift and press 2. If you get a quotation mark instead, your Windows layout is set to UK. Press Windows + Spacebar to cycle layouts until you land on US.
UK and Irish layout
Press Shift + apostrophe. The apostrophe key sits between the colon key and the Enter key on a standard UK QWERTY board.
European layouts with AltGr
The AltGr key is the right side Alt. It acts as a third level shift to reach symbols printed in the bottom right of certain keys.
- Germany or Austria: AltGr + Q
- Spain: AltGr + 2
- Latin America: AltGr + Q
- France AZERTY: AltGr + the accent grave key (top left)
Numeric pad fallback
If a key is broken or your layout is mismapped, hold Alt and type 64 on the numeric keypad, then release. The at sign appears regardless of layout.
Mac
Apple uses the same physical position on a US Mac (Shift + 2) but moves the at sign to Option + 2 on UK and Irish Macs. On French Macs there is a dedicated at key in the top left corner of the alpha block.
iPhone and Android
iOS
Tap the 123 key in the lower left of the on screen keyboard. The at sign sits on the main punctuation page along with the period and the dollar sign. In the mail and messages apps the system also surfaces it as a smart suggestion when it detects you are typing an email address.
Android
On Gboard and Samsung Keyboard the at sign is on the first symbol page. If you are typing in a field tagged as an email address, the keyboard adds an at key right next to the spacebar so you do not have to switch layers.
Linux and Chromebook
Most Linux desktops respect the US, UK, or European layout you select in system settings. If you are stuck on a generic layout, the Unicode shortcut Ctrl + Shift + U, then 0040, then Enter, produces an at sign every time.
Troubleshooting common problems
Shift + 2 gives me a quotation mark
Your active layout is UK instead of US. Switch with Windows + Spacebar on Windows or System Settings then Keyboard then Input Sources on a Mac.
My AltGr key does nothing
Some compact keyboards do not have a right Alt key. Hold Ctrl + Alt together as a substitute, or remap the right Alt key in your OS settings.
The at sign disappears on my old laptop
Spilled liquid is the usual culprit. Use the on screen keyboard (Windows + Ctrl + O on Windows, or the Accessibility keyboard on Mac) until the key is repaired.
FAQs
What is the official name of the at sign?
The character is formally called the commercial at. In many countries it has an animal nickname: little snail in Italian, monkey tail in Dutch, and elephant trunk in Swedish.
Why do social networks use the at sign for handles?
The convention started on early text chat systems where the at sign was used to direct a message at a specific user. Twitter formalised it for handles in 2006 and the rest of the industry followed.
Can I make a custom shortcut for the at sign?
Yes. On Windows you can use PowerToys Keyboard Manager. On Mac, open System Settings then Keyboard then Text Replacements and assign a short trigger like at2 to expand into the symbol.
The takeaway
The at sign sits in a different spot on every layout, but once you know your region you only need two key presses. Save the table above, learn the combination for your daily keyboard, and email addresses stop being a friction point.
Pro tips and edge cases
A few small details about the at sign cause more support tickets than the symbol itself deserves. Cover these once and they stop coming back.
- Voice dictation. Saying at sign during Siri, Google Voice, or Windows Voice Typing inserts the character. Useful for typing email addresses hands free.
- Password fields. Some banking apps block the at sign in passwords. Test before saving, especially on legacy enterprise tools where the input filter is older than the password policy.
- URL encoding. The at sign is percent encoded as %40 in web addresses. If you paste an email link and see %40 instead, the system has already converted it correctly.
- Smart quotes interference. On the UK Windows layout, autocorrect sometimes captures the apostrophe before Shift can register. Disable smart quotes in your editor settings if the at sign keeps turning into a quotation mark.
A quick note on history
The at sign first appeared in 1971 when programmer Ray Tomlinson used it to separate the user from the host in the first networked email. It worked because the character was already on the standard ASR 33 teletype keyboard and was rarely used for anything else, so it would never collide with a username. Five decades later that single decision still defines how every email address on earth is written.
