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<rp>: The Ruby Fallback Parenthesis element

The <rp> HTML element is used to provide fall-back parentheses for browsers that do not support display of ruby annotations using the <ruby> element. One <rp> element should enclose each of the opening and closing parentheses that wrap the <rt> element that contains the annotation's text.

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Attributes

This element only includes the global attributes.

Usage notes

  • Ruby annotations are for showing pronunciation of East Asian characters, like using Japanese furigana or Taiwanese bopomofo characters. The <rp> element is used in the case of lack of <ruby> element support; the <rp> content provides what should be displayed in order to indicate the presence of a ruby annotation, usually parentheses.

Examples

Using ruby annotations

This example uses ruby annotations to display the Romaji equivalents for each character.

html

<ruby><rp>(</rp><rt>Kan</rt><rp>)</rp><rp>(</rp><rt>ji</rt><rp>)</rp>
</ruby>

Result

See the article about the <ruby> element for further examples.

Without ruby support

If your browser does not support ruby annotations, the result looks like this instead:

Technical summary

Content categories None.
Permitted content Text
Tag omission The end tag can be omitted if the element is immediately followed by an <rt> or another <rp> element, or if there is no more content in the parent element.
Permitted parents A <ruby> element. <rp> must be positioned immediately before or after an <rt> element.
Implicit ARIA role No corresponding role
Permitted ARIA roles Any
DOM interface HTMLElement

Specifications

Browser compatibility

Desktop Mobile
Chrome Edge Firefox Internet Explorer Opera Safari WebView Android Chrome Android Firefox for Android Opera Android Safari on IOS Samsung Internet
rp 5 79 38 5 15 5 4.4 18 38 14 4.2 1.0

See also

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Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License v2.5 or later.
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/rp