263D

263D most commonly refers to the Unicode code point U+263D, which is named FIRST QUARTER MOON. It is part of the Miscellaneous Symbols block and is used to represent a crescent moon in calendars, astronomy notation, and iconography. The glyph’s exact appearance can vary between fonts and platforms, but it is generally understood as a crescent with the illuminated portion associated with the first quarter phase in the Northern Hemisphere.

In encoding terms, U+263D is a character in the Unicode standard. In HTML, it can be represented by the numeric character reference ☽ or by its Unicode name. In UTF-8, the character is encoded as a three-byte sequence, with the leading byte typically starting with E2, followed by two continuation bytes. The symbol is widely supported by modern fonts and operating systems, though some lightweight fonts may render it less distinctly.

Related symbols in the same area include U+263E LAST QUARTER MOON and U+263C WHITE SUN WITH RAYS, which together form a small family of astronomical glyphs in the same block. The 263D symbol is commonly used in digital interfaces and documents as a simple moon indicator, in calendars to suggest moon phases, or in general iconography where a crescent moon is desired. While sometimes grouped with emoji sets on certain platforms, it is primarily a textual symbol within the Unicode Miscellaneous Symbols collection.