I searched google a bit, nothing jumped out: Suppose the file '1' words seperated by tabs: host cookie 8 www.execsoft.co.uk $ grep '\b8' 1 host cookie 8 www.execsoft.co.uk $ grep '\t8' 1 $ grep "`echo -e '\t'`8" 1 host cookie 8 www.execsoft.co.uk I could have sworn that shells natively understood \t as tab, but apparently the only way to pass one to a shell is with `echo -e '\t'`, or `echo -e \\\\t`. I must have missed something.