# Mathematical expressions in HTML

There are mainly two options today for typesetting mathematical expressions on web pages in a way that works on all major browser. One works for very simple notations, the other requires JavaScript and offers most of the capabilities of LaTeX math mode.

## Unicode

If all you need are some mathematical symbols, Greek letters and basic subscripts or superscripts, then Unicode/UTF-8 and HTML4 may be sufficient: e − 1 = 0 or x2+y2+z2.

• Useful HTML elements: var, sup, sub
• Greek alphabet: ΑΒΓΔΕΖΗΘΙΚΛΜΝΞΟΠΡΣΤΥΦΧΨΩαβγδεζηθϑικλμνξοπρςστυφχψω
• Character chart

## MathJax

If you need capabilities more like LaTeX (fractions, nested indices, matrixes, etc.), try MathJax. This is a JavaScript library that enhances HTML with many of the mathematical typesetting capabilities of LaTeX, such as $$\mathrm{e}^{\mathrm{i}\pi}-1=0$$ or $$\sum_m|u_m|^2<\infty$$ or $\Phi(z) = \frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi}} \int_0^x \mathrm{e}^{-\frac12 x^2}\,\mathrm{d}x.$

To use MathJax on Computer Laboratory web servers, add the following line to your HTML page right after the <title> element:

<script type="text/javascript"
src="https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/mathjax/MathJax.js?config=TeX-AMS-MML_HTMLorMML"></script>


After that, you can use the normal LaTeX math delimiters \﻿(...\) and \﻿[...\﻿] to enclose inline and displayed equations, respectively.