Visualisation of 1%, 1‰, 1‱ and 1 ppm as the fraction of the red cube to its respective block

A per mille[1][2][3] (from Latin per mīlle, "in each thousand"[4]), also spelled per mil,[1][2][3] per mill,[4][5][6] permil,[4] permill,[4] or permille[3] is a sign indicating parts per thousand. Per mil should not be confused with parts per million (ppm).

The sign is written ‰, which looks like a percent sign (%) with an extra zero in the divisor. It is included in the General Punctuation block of Unicode characters: U+2030 ‰ PER MILLE SIGN (HTML ‰ · ‰ ).[3] It is accessible in Windows using ALT+0137 , and is accessible via a Compose Key using %o .

The term occurs so rarely in English that major dictionaries do not agree on the spelling or pronunciation even within a single dialect of English[7] and some major dictionaries such as Macmillan[8] and Longman[9] do not even contain an entry. The term is more common in other European languages where it is used in contexts, such as blood alcohol content, that are usually expressed as a percentage in English-speaking countries.

Examples [ edit ]

A railroad distance and gradient sign in the Czech Republic . The 20‰ grade is equivalent to 2%.

Examples of use include:

Related units [ edit ]