The ruble sign, , is the

currency sign A currency symbol or currency sign is a graphic symbol used to denote a currency unit. Usually it is defined by a monetary authority, such as the national central bank for the currency concerned. A symbol may be positioned in various ways, acc ...

used for the

Russian ruble The ruble or rouble (; Currency symbol, symbol: ₽; ISO 4217, ISO code: RUB) is the currency of the Russia, Russian Federation. Banknotes and coins are issued by the Central Bank of Russia, which is Russia's central bank, monetary authority ind ...

, the official

currency A currency is a standardization of money in any form, in use or circulation as a medium of exchange, for example banknotes and coins. A more general definition is that a currency is a ''system of money'' in common use within a specific envi ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

. Its form is a Cyrillic letter Р with an additional horizontal stroke. The design was approved on 11 December 2013 after a public poll that took place a month earlier. In

Russian orthography Russian orthography () is an orthography, orthographic tradition formally considered to encompass spelling ( rus, орфогра́фия, r=orfografiya, p=ɐrfɐˈɡrafʲɪjə) and punctuation ( rus, пунктуа́ция, r=punktuatsiya, p=p ...

, the sign almost always follows the number (the monetary value), and in many cases there is a space between the two. In

English orthography English orthography comprises the set of rules used when writing the English language, allowing readers and writers to associate written graphemes with the sounds of spoken English, as well as other features of the language. English's orthograp ...

, it usually precedes the number.

History

In the 18th and 19th centuries there was a symbol for the Russian ruble consisting of lower case Cyrillic letters — a rotated р on a у. In the 20th century р. was used to abbreviate the ruble. The debates about adopting a national currency symbol for the Russian ruble began nearly from the start of Russia's transition to a market economy and its economic integration into the global market in the 1990s, soon after the

dissolution of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Declaration No. 142-Н of ...

. The idea was to reach the same level of recognition and therefore of influence as well-known currency signs such as $ (the

US dollar The United States dollar (symbol: $; currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introduced the U.S. dollar at par with the Spanish silver dollar, divided it int ...

), € (the

euro The euro (currency symbol, symbol: euro sign, €; ISO 4217, currency code: EUR) is the official currency of 20 of the Member state of the European Union, member states of the European Union. This group of states is officially known as the ...

), ¥ (the

Chinese yuan The renminbi ( ; currency symbol, symbol: Yen and yuan sign, ¥; ISO 4217, ISO code: CNY; abbreviation: RMB), also known as the Chinese yuan, is the official currency of the China, People's Republic of China. The renminbi is issued by the Peop ...

or the

Japanese yen The is the official currency of Japan. It is the third-most traded currency in the foreign exchange market, after the United States dollar and the euro. It is also widely used as a third reserve currency after the US dollar and the euro. Th ...

) and £ (the

Pound sterling Sterling (symbol: £; currency code: GBP) is the currency of the United Kingdom and nine of its associated territories. The pound is the main unit of sterling, and the word '' pound'' is also used to refer to the British currency general ...

). There were several contests to choose the ruble sign, hosted by different organizations. However, the

Central Bank of Russia The Central Bank of the Russian Federation (), commonly known as the Bank of Russia (), also called the Central Bank of Russia (CBR), is the central bank of the Russia, Russian Federation. The bank was established on 13 July 1990. It traces its ...

did not adopt one of the winning symbols from these early contests. In 2007, a group of Russian design bureaus and studios proposed to use ₽, the stroked Cyrillic letter Р to represent the ruble. Soon after, many electronic retailers, restaurants and cafés started to use the sign unofficially. It became very popular and was widely used as a de facto standard. In November 2013, the

finally decided to adopt a national currency sign. It placed a public poll on its website with five pre-chosen options. The design provided earlier by the design community that was informally yet widely used (₽) was on the poll's list and got the most votes. On 11 December 2013, ₽ was approved as the official sign for the Russian Federation's ruble.

Coding

The international three-letter code (according to International Organization for Standardization (ISO) standard

ISO 4217 ISO 4217 is a standard published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) that defines alpha codes and numeric codes for the representation of currencies and provides information about the relationships between individ ...

) for the ruble is RUB. In

Unicode Unicode or ''The Unicode Standard'' or TUS is a character encoding standard maintained by the Unicode Consortium designed to support the use of text in all of the world's writing systems that can be digitized. Version 16.0 defines 154,998 Char ...

, it is encoded at .

Other uses of the symbol

The cryptocurrency Petro, backed by government of

Venezuela Venezuela, officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many Federal Dependencies of Venezuela, islands and islets in the Caribbean Sea. It com ...

, uses the same symbol as the Ruble, although usually with a rounder upper part ( Petro sign

). A currency symbol used in the ''

Pokémon is a Japanese media franchise consisting of List of Pokémon video games, video games, Pokémon (TV series), animated series and List of Pokémon films, films, Pokémon Trading Card Game, a trading card game, and other related media. The fran ...

'' media franchise is visually similar to the Ruble sign but instead has two strokes ( ).

Notes

References

{{Currency symbols Currency symbols Economy of Russia Symbols introduced in 2013 Currencies of Russia Cyrillic letters with diacritics