What punctuation mark is placed at the end of a direct question?

The punctuation mark placed at the end of a direct question is the question mark.

In English, the question mark replaces the period at the end of an interrogative sentence, as in “Where are you going?” It can also mark a question expressed as a phrase or clause. The symbol is commonly called an interrogation point, query, or eroteme.

Its history reaches back to medieval manuscripts. A question-like mark called the punctus interrogativus appears in the eighth-century Godescalc Evangelistary. By the early thirteenth century, scribes increasingly used the curved mark specifically for interrogative sentences, helping establish the modern form.

Usage varies across languages. Spanish uses an opening inverted question mark, ¿, as well as a closing ?. French normally places a narrow space before the mark, while English does not. The mark is also different from a semicolon, which separates related statements, and an exclamation mark, which signals strong feeling or emphasis.