by Marcel Dufresne
Jan 16, 2023

PopChar is a menu bar utility that lets you insert those hard-to-remember hidden font characters into your documents. I first started using PopChar about 25 years ago. I needed an easy way to put in French-accented characters. Back then, these were available using a combination of key clicks which I was always forgetting. With PopChar I could simply paste the desired characters in. I never needed to search for or remember keystrokes. I know that it is a lot easier now to insert those French accents but there are still many other characters available that are not easy to find. This 30-year-old application provides access to these somewhat hidden characters. Even though PopChar is quite old, it has been continually evolving and is now better than ever.

When you open up the PopChar window from the menu bar you are presented with a wealth of hidden characters that are part of the numerous fonts you already have installed on your computer. Besides the French accents, I can quickly find any character I want regardless of the language. Each font you have installed might not have the exact character you need but with PopChar you can find whatever one you want from all those others. Besides specific characters, pictures and emojis can be added to any document. Have a look at the following set of characters that I quickly dug up. Besides the French accent, you can get flags, music 🎶, math ∓, Greek α, computer ⌘, pointers ← , etc. Chances are if you need a character, it is probably already installed on your computer.
PopChar quickly installs and is visible as a “P” in either top corner of the menu bar or in the menu bar. It can be made invisible until the cursor hovers over it in the corner. I prefer this invisible mode. That way the “P” remains hidden but is always available when I need it.
Suppose you want to insert the copyright symbol in a text document. You could simply type in ⌥-G and the © symbol would appear. But most of us have not memorized this keystroke command. With PopChar you put the insertion point where you wish to insert the symbol, then activate the PopChar window from the menu bar. If the © symbol is not immediately located in the window, then search for it using the top right window in PopChar. To insert the copyright symbol in your document, simply click the symbol. The PopChar window closes and the copyright symbol is now in your document. When you scroll over a character in PopChar, you get valuable extra information about the selected character. This information tells you that the copyright symbol has the Unicode number 169, or “00A9” in hexadecimal, and the name of the symbol is “COPYRIGHT SIGN”. PopChar also displays the keystrokes needed to generate this character from the keyboard, that being opt+“G” (⌥G) on a US keyboard.

In the Unicode character table, the available characters are arranged in groups, each with a dark heading. The number in parentheses is the number of characters in this group. You can click the triangle to collapse groups you don’t need. In this way, you can reduce the number of characters shown in the PopChar table, so you get a better overview of the remaining characters. This can be particularly handy for fonts with thousands of entries.
One of the best functions in PopChar is the ‘Favorites’ bar. I have saved the characters I most often need to look up here. This way I don’t have to go looking for them. They are located at the top of the PopChar window. A newer feature of PopChar is the ‘Recent Characters’ which is right below the Favorites group. It contains those characters that you have recently used, in reverse order, so that the most recently used characters are listed first. This section is automatically updated whenever you click characters to insert them into documents. This section is limited to two lines, so a recent character will eventually disappear when you use many other characters.
Searching for a specific symbol might be difficult at times, especially if you do not know its official name. You can try typing ideas into the search field. For instance, if you type ‘math’ then all the characters in the “Mathematical Operators” block will be displayed, even if they do not have the term “math” in their names. If this still does not work, then PopChar allows you to draw the shape of a character on the screen to tell it what you are looking for.

You can use the Character Size slider in the PopChar Preferences to choose an appropriate display size. PopChar computes the font size based on this setting, such that characters from any font take up approximately the same space. The size that you set with this slider affects all fonts. You can then fine-tune the sizes of individual fonts, using the slider at the bottom of the PopChar window. For example, you may want to enlarge the characters of a single font that contains very small or fine characters. To see an enlarged view of just one character with small details, activate the magnifier symbol below the character table. Whenever you point at a character, PopChar then displays a close-up view of that character.
It is possible to create custom groupings and arrangements for characters. It will also list the collections you have made with Font Book. The emojis’ layout has been defined so that they are arranged by their meaning. When you look at the characters in the Apple Color Emoji font, you will notice that some of them have a small circle in the bottom right corner. This is the “skin tone indicator” that shows which characters (mostly faces) are available in different skin tones. Click the circle to insert a variant of the character with a specific skin tone. The user guide (Help) found under the gear icon (⚙) will help you with any questions you might have.

Some of what PopChar can do is already available for free with your Mac OS. French accents and others can be added in by holding down for instance the ‘e’ key. All the variations of è or ê will pop up and you can choose the one you want. The same can be said using the Keyboard System Preference. ‘Show Character View’ will display many hidden symbols, although there is no searchability. PopChar is much easier to use and much more versatile. PopChar lets you switch fonts quickly. The name and the keyboard shortcut are helpful functions. This application shows all the hundreds of hidden characters for a specific font and not just some of them. According to PopChar’s About information, I have over 200 fonts on my computer which encompasses over 60,000 unique characters. I have organized these into various categories but I still need PopChar to help find what I want to use. Don’t find yourself hunting for characters. Get PopChar. Click here to read more about this wonderful application. I have been using it for many years and I see no reason to stop. It is an essential utility for me and is still far better than anything now included in the Mac OS.