Windows code page

Windows code pages are sets of characters or <a href="/facts/Code_pages/tgcBrILG">code pages</a> (known as <a href="/facts/Character_encoding/ShJHIMoA">character encodings</a> in other operating systems) used in <a href="/facts/Microsoft_Windows/bwhAhuSL">Microsoft Windows</a> from the 1980s and 1990s. Windows code pages were gradually superseded when <a href="/facts/Unicode_in_Microsoft_Windows/KklG49qq">Unicode was implemented in Windows</a>, although they are still supported both within Windows and other platforms, and still apply when <a href="/facts/Alt_code/XTbk2kMs">Alt code</a> shortcuts are used. 
Current Windows versions support <a href="/facts/Unicode/DDu3MfPV">Unicode</a>, new Windows applications should use Unicode (UTF-8) and not 8-bit character encodings.
There are two groups of system code pages in Windows systems: OEM and Windows-native ("ANSI") code pages.
(ANSI is the <a href="/facts/American_National_Standards_Institute/p3d1TQCb">American National Standards Institute</a>.) Code pages in both of these groups are <a href="/facts/Extended_ASCII/Agfdo1R0">extended ASCII</a> code pages. Additional code pages are supported by standard Windows conversion routines, but not used as either type of system code page.

Windows code page open-in-new

Windows code page