Adding the Ruble to Office
Microsoft adds the Ruble symbol to Windows 8.1 and we show you how to add it to earlier versions of Windows.
Part of the Windows 8.1 August 2014 update is the addition of the new Russian Ruble currency symbol.
All Microsoft will say about this change is “This feature adds new Ruble currency support for input and rendering.” with no details about the symbol or where to find it. So we’ve done that work for them
Back in December 2013, the Russian government approved a change in the Ruble currency sign to this:
This symbol was added to the Unicode v7 character set and given the code 20BD (U+20BD).
The August 2014 Update to Windows 8.1 adds this symbol, as you can see in the Microsoft Office; Insert | Symbol dialog:
Unfortunately, Microsoft neglected to add the name of the Symbol which makes it harder to find in the Windows Character Map accessory (which has a name search feature).
In Office the clumsy shortcut for the Ruble symbol is 20BD then Alt + X.
The Ruble symbol is now the default currency symbol setting for the Russian region in Windows. It will also show up in the on-screen keyboard when it’s set to Russian layout.
There’s more detail on the Ruble symbol update to Windows and a lot more in Windows 8.1 for Microsoft Office users which has been refreshed to include the August 2014 changes.
If you don’t have Windows 8.1 with the August 2014 update, you can still insert the Ruble symbol into documents. You’ll need a Unicode v7 compatible font and, at the moment, there’s few of those around. We’ve already mentioned Symbol A, a free TrueType font that has most, if not all, the new Unicode 7 characters.
As you can see, the Ruble symbol hasn’t made it to Arial Unicode MS, a font that can usually relied upon for character support. Presumably it’ll appear in a future update of the font.