If you’ve ever found yourself confused about the difference between a dash and a hyphen, and when to use a hyphen, you’re far from alone. When you handwrite them, they probably look exactly the same.

Looking through some students’ scripts on Wednesday, I discovered there is a need to revisit the issue of the uses of the hyphen (-) and dash (—). Many still find it difficult to differentiate between ...

When you’re writing by hand, a hyphen and a dash can look pretty similar, although the meanings differ. You might throw in a hyphen to link two well-known words or add a dash—for impact, of course.

The dash and the hyphen are as different as the kiwi and the kiwi (the fruit and the animal). The hyphen (-) is used to hold two words or two parts of words together. The dash is used to add bonus ...

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been giving this note to my editing clients: “Replace floating hyphen with proper em dash.” It comes up when I’m proofreading images, like PDFs, and I see a hyphen ...

I don’t talk much here about the en dash — the little punctuation mark that looks like it can’t decide if it’s a hyphen or a full-fledged dash. There are a couple of reasons I avoid the subject. For ...

Hyphens, en dashes, and em dashes are frequently tested punctuation marks in government exam descriptive writing papers. Hyphens connect words, en dashes show ranges or relationships, and em dashes ...