# How to render a non-ASCII character?

**URL:** <https://zola.discourse.group/t/how-to-render-a-non-ascii-character/2600>\
**Category:** Uncategorized\
**Created:** [May 7, 2025, 9:28pm UTC](https://zola.discourse.group/t/how-to-render-a-non-ascii-character/2600 "2025-05-07T21:28:14Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![InnocentusLime](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/zola.discourse.group/innocentuslime/32/1456_2.png) [@InnocentusLime](https://zola.discourse.group/u/InnocentusLime)\
**Post date:** [May 7, 2025, 9:28pm UTC](https://zola.discourse.group/t/how-to-render-a-non-ascii-character/2600/1 "2025-05-07T21:28:14Z")

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Hello!

I am trying to use a German umlaut (ö) in my Zola `.md` file and can’t get to make it work.

The HTML eccape code `&ouml;` just seems to turn into a jumbled mess too. Does anyone know the way around?

```auto
# Testing stuff

Royks&ouml;pp

```

It renders as `Royksöpp` instead of `Royksöpp`

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**Author:** ![keats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/34f0e0/32.png) [@keats](https://zola.discourse.group/u/keats)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2025, 11:11am UTC](https://zola.discourse.group/t/how-to-render-a-non-ascii-character/2600/2 "2025-05-08T11:11:13Z")

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Why do you need to escape in Markdown? It should just work if you use Royksöpp

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**Author:** ![InnocentusLime](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/zola.discourse.group/innocentuslime/32/1456_2.png) [@InnocentusLime](https://zola.discourse.group/u/InnocentusLime)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2025, 12:36pm UTC](https://zola.discourse.group/t/how-to-render-a-non-ascii-character/2600/3 "2025-05-08T12:36:50Z")

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> [@keats](#):
>
> Why do you need to escape in Markdown? It should just work if you use Royksöpp

Hello!

Sorry for not pointing that out in the original post. I did that too (tried a UTF8 character instead) and got the same outcome – the same 2 corrupt looking symbols.

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**Author:** ![sal](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/zola.discourse.group/sal/32/1334_2.png) [@sal](https://zola.discourse.group/u/sal)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2025, 4:50pm UTC](https://zola.discourse.group/t/how-to-render-a-non-ascii-character/2600/4 "2025-05-08T16:50:44Z")

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I think you should add `<meta charset="utf-8" />` inside the `head` element.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![InnocentusLime](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/zola.discourse.group/innocentuslime/32/1456_2.png) [@InnocentusLime](https://zola.discourse.group/u/InnocentusLime)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2025, 5:30pm UTC](https://zola.discourse.group/t/how-to-render-a-non-ascii-character/2600/5 "2025-05-08T17:30:06Z")

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Right! Just noticed that I forgot to do that in my base template.  
Yeah, setting the charset to utf-8 fixed the issue 😃

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![InnocentusLime](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/zola.discourse.group/innocentuslime/32/1456_2.png) [@InnocentusLime](https://zola.discourse.group/u/InnocentusLime)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2025, 5:40pm UTC](https://zola.discourse.group/t/how-to-render-a-non-ascii-character/2600/6 "2025-05-08T17:40:50Z")

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@sal Though, it also implies that using an HTML escape code in markdown, will lead to output which will not render correctly without `utf-8` in head XD

No idea if that is intentional.