The letters underneath are real
Unlike most fancy text, these styles keep your ordinary letters and add a “combining” character after each one: U+0336 draws a stroke through the letter before it, U+0332 a line under it. That means search and screen readers still see the real word underneath (many readers ignore the marks, some announce them). The catch is looks: whether the strokes join into one smooth line depends on the font, so it can look dashed on some phones.
Discord and Reddit have real strikethrough with ~~two tildes~~, and WhatsApp with ~one~. Use those where they exist.
Questions
- How do I strikethrough text on Instagram or X?
- Neither has formatting. Copy the strikethrough line above and paste it.
- Why is my strikethrough dashed?
- Each letter gets its own stroke. Whether the strokes touch depends on the font on the reader's device.