What Om means
Om, also written Aum, is the most sacred sound in Hinduism. It is chanted at the beginning and end of prayers, mantras and many yoga classes, and in the Upanishads it is identified with Brahman, the ultimate reality.
The three sounds A, U and M are often explained as waking, dreaming and deep sleep, with the silence after them as a fourth state, an idea from the Mandukya Upanishad. The Devanagari sign ॐ writes the whole syllable as a single character.
Om in other religions and scripts
Om is also sacred in Buddhism and Jainism. Tibetan Buddhists write it ༀ, the first syllable of the mantra "om mani padme hum", and Unicode includes a Jain variant ꣽ. Tamil ௐ and Gujarati ૐ are the same syllable in other Indian scripts.
ੴ (Ik Onkar) looks related but is a different, Sikh symbol. It means "one God" and opens the Sikh scripture, the Guru Granth Sahib.
Other Hindu symbols and how to type Om
The trishula 🔱 is the trident of Shiva, the diya 🪔 is the oil lamp lit at Diwali, and the lotus 🪷 is linked to the goddess Lakshmi and the god Vishnu. The swastika 卐 is an ancient Hindu sign of good fortune, drawn at doorways and in rituals; its meaning in Hinduism is unrelated to the 20th-century Nazi emblem.
In Microsoft Word, type 0950 and press Alt + X for ॐ. In HTML, write ॐ. On a phone, search "om" in the emoji keyboard for 🕉︎. For the dharma wheel, see the Buddhist symbol page, and for more three-pronged designs, see trident symbols.