What is this symbol? ⎋ (it is listed as menu shortcut)

Question

The shortcut that is reported in the -menu, for Force Quit menu-item, is ⌥⌘⎋ (the last character is the Unicode broken circle with northwest arrow). What key should I press to invoke the Force Quit menu-item?

Answer 1

To be concise: the symbol you're asking about, the circle with the arrow escaping from it (that's the way I remember what it means), is the Apple way of saying 'The ESC Key'.

So the menu item ⌥⌘⎋ is option+command+esc pressed simultaneously.

Answer 2

The Escape key.

I don't know why Apple use this non-standard symbol, but they always have...

Here is a full list of all of the symbols that Apple use.

Answer 3

As an extension to Ian's answer, here's a list of all the keys:

Apple Special Key Symbols

As correctly pointed out by Ian, the ⎋ is the Escape key located on the upper left side of your keyboard.

Answer 4

You can find a list of all the keyboard icons, terminology, and HTML entities over here on Meta . That icon ⎋ is the Escape key. You can find it in the very top left-hand corner of your keyboard.