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A macron is a diacritic ¯ placed over a vowel originally to indicate that the vowel is long. When editing a Wikipedia page, macron characters appear below the edit box, and can be inserted into the edit box by clicking the appropriate character (in JavaScript-enabled browsers). A macron can also be input directly from the keyboard.

ABC Extended keyboard layout

This will work in Panther (10.3), Tiger (10.4), Leopard (10.5), Snow Leopard (10.6), Yosemite (10.10), El Capitan (10.11), Sierra (10.12), and Catalina (10.15). It is unverified in other versions.

1. First, enable the ABC Extended layout (called U.S. Extended in versions prior to El Capitan).
   1. To do this, open System Preferences by clicking the Apple logo in the upper left hand corner of your screen and then clicking “System Preferences…” or the method that you prefer to open System Preferences.
   2. Open Keyboard by clicking the icon in the System Preferences labelled “Keyboard.”
   3. Switch to the Input Sources section by clicking on the “Input Sources” button near the top of the window.
   4. Scroll down to the layout labeled ABC Extended and click the check-box next to it. The ABC Extended layout has now been enabled, in addition to any keyboard layouts which had previously been enabled.
   5. Note: In Mavericks (10.9), once you are on the Input Sources section, you may have to do the following: 1. Click the “+” button in the lower left corner; a drop-down panel appears. 2. In the left column, select English as the language. 3. The scrolling list on the right lists input sources for the English language; scroll down and select ABC Extended (or U.S. Extended). 4. Click the Add button to add this input source; the icon of ABC Extended is the letter A in a squircle, the icon of U.S. Extended is an American flag with a white “U” in a black square below the flag.
   6. Note: Upon adding this option, it’s best to logout or restart your computer. In the upper right hand corner you will see a flag (between the volume symbol and the day/time); this is where the keyboard input options menu is located.
   7. Once the ABC Extended layout is enabled, it will always remain enabled, but not necessarily active. To quickly switch between the ABC Extended layout and other keyboard layouts, make sure the “Show input menu in menu bar” check-box at the bottom of the window is checked. A new icon should appear in your menu bar when this box is checked.
2. Next, switch to the ABC Extended keyboard layout.
   1. Click the input menu icon (which was enabled in the previous step) in your menu bar.
   2. Select ABC Extended from your list. ABC Extended is now activated.
3. Finally, enter the letter to bear a macron from the keyboard.
   1. First type ⌥ Option+a (this means to hold down the ⌥ Option key and then press a).
   2. Type in the letter you wish to place a macron above. Congratulations! You have now typed in a letter bearing a macron.

Note that not every character can be combined with a macron in this manner. For example, as of Catalina (10.15), ā works, but ¯x does not.

Character Viewer

macOS also has a character picker called Character Viewer in which you can search for all Unicode characters. Character Viewer can be accessed via the menu bar (Edit > Emoji & Symbols) or with a keyboard shortcut (Control+⌘ Command+Space). However, Character Viewer may not be available in all applications: for example, as of 2021 Firefox does not support it.

Accent menu

The accent menu is available since Mountain Lion (10.8) and works for basic vowels with macrons. Press and hold the respective vowel key. A popup menu will show various numbered character variants. Press the corresponding number key to select a character variant. Alternatively, use Tab ↹ or the arrow keys to navigate the menu and then confirm by pressing Return or by continuing to type other letters.

Alt-Latin keyboard layout

For Windows 10

Download and install this updated version of Alt-Latin keyboard layout described below. Installation instructions are similar to the steps described below (and can be also found here).

For older versions of Windows

1. Download and install this free keyboard layout.
   1. Under "Downloads", Select "Download Alt-Latin for Windows".
      1. If asked what to do with, choose "Save to Disk."
   2. Unzip the file.
      1. To do this, navigate to the "AltLatNT.zip" file you just downloaded, right-click it, and select "Extract Here" from the list. A folder titled "AltLatin_Win" should appear.
      2. Open the folder "AltLatin_Win," then open up the folder "AltLatin," and finally open up the installer "AltLatin.msi." After a few seconds a window will appear informing you that the installation is complete. If this window does not appear, you may have run "AltLatin.msi" without extracting it from the zip archive.
2. Make Alt-Latin your default keyboard layout using the "Regional and Language Options" control panel then restart your computer.
   1. Click the "start" menu icon button which is most likely in the bottom left hand corner of your screen. From this menu select "Control Panel." From the control panels, open the "Regional and Language Options"
   2. In the "Regional and Language Options" click the "Languages" tab then click the "Details…" button.
   3. From the "Settings" tab of the "Text Services and Input Languages" window, click the "Add…" Button.
   4. From the "Add Input Language" window make sure the "Keyboard layout/IME" check-box is checked.
   5. From the "Keyboard layout/IME" popup menu select "Alt-Latin" and click the "OK" button.
   6. Back in the "Text Services and Input Languages" window, in the "Default input languages" section, click the popup menu and click "English (United States) - Alt-Latin" in the list. Alt-Latin in now your default keyboard layout.
   7. Click the "Advanced" tab. From this tab make sure that "Turn off advanced text services" is unchecked. If it is checked, uncheck it now.
   8. Restart your computer.
   1. To restart, open the start menu and select "Turn Off Computer," then click "Restart."
   9. A language bar should appear. It should read "Alt-Latin." If it does not read "Alt-Latin" then you did not make it your default layout and will need to repeat section II.
3. Pressing the right Alt key (often marked AltGr) before a vowel places a macron above it.
   1. Hold down the right Alt (AltGr) key. While still holding down on the right Alt key, press the a key on your keyboard. Release all keys.
   2. Now the next vowel you type in will have a macron placed above it.

U.S. Extended keyboard layout

This method uses a Windows port of the U.S. Extended (ABC Extended) keyboard layout described in the macOS section of this article.

1. Download the Windows port of the U.S. Extended keyboard layout (us-ext.zip).
2. Unzip us-ext.zip and run setup.exe.
3. After the installation the new keyboard layout should be available in the input menu.
4. Select the U.S. Extended keyboard layout in the input menu.
5. To type a macron, first press AltGr+a (Right Alt+a) and then the letter that should carry the macron.

Most Latin on-screen keyboards offer variants with macrons after tapping and holding on the respective vowel. You may need to tweak your keyboard or language settings if some vowels with macron are missing.