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Nested arcs radiating from a dot, indicating a wireless network signal.
Also known as: Wireless symbol, WiFi bars, Signal arcs
Arcs fanning out from a point indicate a wireless network and its strength. The number of filled arcs shows signal quality, not connection speed — a distinction users routinely conflate.
Indicates a wireless network connection, with the number of filled arcs showing signal strength.
Contexts: Software
Shows signal strength rather than internet speed or availability: full arcs with no working connection is a normal and frequently misread state.
A common misunderstanding worth stating plainly — strength to the access point says nothing about the connection beyond it.
Contexts: Software
Is not a single standardised drawing; platforms differ in arc count and whether the origin dot is shown.
Contexts: Software
Shows a number of filled arcs, and how many are filled is a manufacturer's judgement rather than a measurement anybody has agreed. Two bars on one device and three on another in the same room is normal: each vendor maps received signal strength to bars its own way, and none of the mappings is published as a standard.
Contexts: Software, Electrical equipment
Is used in two quite different senses. On a device it reports the strength of a connection; on a café window, a hotel sign or a train carriage it advertises that a network exists. The same arcs mean 'how well am I connected' in one place and 'connection available here' in the other.
Contexts: Public information, Software
Related forms that are not treated as separate canonical symbols — see our variant rules.
Arcs over a dot
The commonest drawing: a filled dot with two or three concentric arcs above it, radiating upward.
Bars form
Ascending vertical bars used in place of arcs on some platforms and for cellular signal on most. The two are frequently swapped, and neither is reserved to one technology.
A small filled dot at the base with two or three curved arcs above it, each wider than the last, fanning upward.
Both are drawn as nested arcs radiating from a point. The Wi-Fi mark fans upward and the contactless mark sideways, which is the whole visual distinction between them.