Properly Punctuated: Hashtag versus Pound Sign

Posted December 14, 2023 by Kathy Davie in Author Resources, Self-Editing, Word Confusions, Writing

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It was my own curiosity that led me to explore the # sign. What is the difference in this symbol hashtag versus pound sign?

It turns out that the only real difference (when writing out #) is that a hashtag uses it in front of the text and numbers while the pound uses it for weight and is placed behind the numbers.

Hashtag has many definitions as a noun (only one as a verb). It’s most popular usage is as an indicator for a metadata tag in social media.

Pound is split between weight and money (in this post), and while the money symbol doesn’t actually relate to the # symbol, it does refer to numbers. I thought it was important to include £.

NOTE: Pound, in this post, is only defined as a noun in terms of weight or money.

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The Properly Punctuated explores . . .

. . . the proper use of quotation marks, commas, semicolons, colons, ellipsis, etc., including how to properly mark dialog, ahem. As Properly Punctuated is in no way complete, I would appreciate suggestions and comments from anyone on punctuation with which you struggle or on which you can contribute more understanding.

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Hashtag	Pound Sign
#, (symbol)
Punctuation: Formatting
Handwritten Hashtag Text by j4p4n is under the CC0 1.0 license, via OpenClipArt.	Day 245. Mission Accomplished by David Mulder is under the CC BY-SA 2.0 license, via Flickr. — He’s down to 198#.
Part of Grammar:
NounVerb, intransitive & transitive Plural for the noun: hashtags Third person present verb: hashtags Past tense or past participle: hashtagged Present participle: hashttagging A.k.a. hash [British], hash mark, hash sign, hash symbol, number sign, octothorp, octothorpe	Noun Abbreviation: lb. A.k.a. avoirdupois weight, quid, smacker, smackeroo, nicker, oner, once
Noun: Used as a symbol on a phone keypad or computer keyboard or before a numeral [Communications; Information] A digital tag that inscribes keywords as metadata and facilitates the categorization and organization of digital content by topic Used on social media sites and applications before a word or phrase to identify digital content on a specific topic [Computers] Used in computer programming languages to denote comments or annotations in code Verb: To add a hashtag to (a word, topic, or message	Noun: [North American English] Used as a symbol representing a pound as a unit of weight or mass A unit of weight in general use equal to 16 oz. avoirdupois (0.4536 kg) A unit of weight equal to 12 oz. troy (0.3732 kg) used for precious metals [Plural pounds sterling] The sign £, representing a British pound sterling, equal to 100 pence [British; historical] Sovereign [Irish; 1921 to 2001; punt] The basic monetary unit of the Republic of Ireland (until replaced by the euro), equal to 100 Irish pence [Middle Eastern] The basic monetary unit of several Middle Eastern countries, equal to 100 piastres [Cypriot; 1960 to 2008] The former basic monetary unit of Cyprus, equal to 100 cents [Sudanese] The basic monetary unit of Sudan
Examples:
Noun: Do you know the answer to question #2? He lives in #234. Only use a #2 pencil on the test. In Python, a hashmark tells the interpreter to ignore the rest of the line of code. Hashtags are used on microblogging and photo-sharing services such as X (formerly Twitter), Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube. “After the initial hash symbol, a hashtag may include letters, numerals, or underscores” (Hashtag). The hashtag #MeToo is a type of hashtag activism, spreading awareness of sexual harassment accusations. Verb, intransitive: People like to hashtag. Don’t forget to hashtag. I can hashtag. Verb, transitive: Someone on Twitter just hashtagged the film festival. “The athlete hashtagged his post #luckyman.” We hashtag our posts about history with #HistoryMatters so you can find them easily.	Noun: Peel 3# pounds of potatoes, please. Don’t forget to pick up a 5# bag of sugar. For this size, it weights 10#. That’ll be £3. The bank reports that £10 million was stolen. She owes him £10.
Derivatives:
Adjective: hashtagged	Noun: poundage
History of the Word:
First recorded in 2005–10; hash (mark) + tag (in the sense a label or keyword). It may be related to an art technique called hatching.	First recorded before 900; Middle English; Old English pund cognate with the Dutch pond, the German Pfund, the Gothic, Old Norse pund, ultimately from the Latin pondō meaning by weight, in weight (adverb), in the phrase libra pondō meaning a pound by weight.

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C’mon, get it out of your system, bitch, whine, moan . . . which words are your pet peeves? Also, please note that I try to be as accurate as I can, but mistakes happen or I miss something. Email me if you find errors, so I can fix them . . . and we’ll all benefit!

Satisfy your curiosity about other Properly Punctuated posts on its homepage or more generally explore the index of self-editing posts. You may also want to explore Book Layout & Formatting Ideas, Formatting Tips, Grammar Explanations, Linguistics, Publishing Tips, Word Confusions, Writing Ideas and Resources, and Working Your Website.

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