String.prototype.codePointAt()

The codePointAt() method returns a non-negative integer that is the Unicode code point value at the given position. Note that this function does not give the nth code point in a string, but the code point starting at the specified string index.

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Syntax

codePointAt(pos)

Parameters

pos

Position of an element in str to return the code point value from.

Return value

A decimal number representing the code point value of the character at the given pos.

  • If there is no element at pos, returns undefined.
  • If the element at pos is a UTF-16 high surrogate, returns the code point of the surrogate pair.
  • If the element at pos is a UTF-16 low surrogate, returns only the low surrogate code point.

Examples

Using codePointAt()

"ABC".codePointAt(0); // 65
"ABC".codePointAt(0).toString(16); // 41

"😍".codePointAt(0); // 128525
"\ud83d\ude0d".codePointAt(0); // 128525
"\ud83d\ude0d".codePointAt(0).toString(16); // 1f60d

"😍".codePointAt(1); // 56845
"\ud83d\ude0d".codePointAt(1); // 56845
"\ud83d\ude0d".codePointAt(1).toString(16); // de0d

"ABC".codePointAt(42); // undefined

Looping with codePointAt()

Because indexing to a pos whose element is a UTF-16 low surrogate, returns only the low surrogate, it's better not to index directly into a UTF-16 string.

Instead, use a for...of statement or an Array's forEach() method (or anything which correctly iterates UTF-16 surrogates) to iterate the string, using codePointAt(0) to get the code point of each element. 

for (const codePoint of "\ud83d\udc0e\ud83d\udc71\u2764") {
  console.log(codePoint.codePointAt(0).toString(16));
}
// '1f40e', '1f471', '2764'

Specifications

Specification
ECMAScript Language Specification
# sec-string.prototype.codepointat

Browser compatibility

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See also