Lookalike letters
CYRILLIC SMALL LETTER O (U+043E)
The Cyrillic letter o, drawn identically to Latin o in every font in common use.
- Codepoint
U+043E- Also written as
u043e\u043eо- Category
- Lookalike letters
- Removed by default
- No
- Governing option
- Lookalike letters
--confusables - Can be load-bearing
- No
Copy and paste U+043E
To copy and paste CYRILLIC SMALL LETTER O (U+043E), press the button: the character itself goes to your clipboard, and Ctrl+V (Cmd+V on a Mac) pastes it anywhere you can type.
Where it comes from
Cyrillic text, mixed-layout typing, and deliberate substitution in domain names, usernames and filter evasion.
Why it matters
The letter o is common enough that swapping one is nearly free: most words offer a target, and the substitution is invisible.
Before and after
The first o is Cyrillic. Nothing on screen says so.
The character is shown as a labelled chip so you can see where it sits. In your text it draws nothing at all.
When it is legitimate
In every language written in Cyrillic: Russian, Ukrainian, Bulgarian, Serbian, Macedonian and dozens more.
How to remove it
Turn on Lookalike letters (`--confusables`); inside a mixed-script word like "gоogle" it becomes Latin "o". A word that is all Cyrillic is left alone, and not reported. Opt-in, because it rewrites letters you can see.
Working in a file rather than a paste? The document report for .docx, .odt and .html finds it inside the file, together with hidden runs and tracked changes, without you having to open it. If the question is what the rest of the writing does rather than what this one character does, count the tell words and phrases per thousand words and see where each habit sits, with no score and no claim about who wrote the text.
Is it an AI watermark?
Not a watermark
No. Homoglyph substitution is a human technique. It is not something a language model does to its own output.
No connection to machine-generated text. It comes from software, from a keyboard, or from a person.
Questions
How can I spot one without a tool?
You cannot, reliably. In most fonts the two letters are the same shape. Searching for the Latin word will fail, which is often the first clue.
Is Greek omicron the same problem?
Yes. U+03BF is also drawn as an o. The confusables table covers Greek, Armenian, Cherokee and more, all generated from Unicode's own confusables data.
Check your own text
Paste anything into the cleaner to see every hidden character it contains, with position, codepoint and what happens to each one. Nothing is uploaded.
Check your own textClean it in Chrome as you pasteClean it on your Mac with one keystrokeAll characters