Character Counter

Count characters as you type

Type into the box above or paste text from a document, form, social post or editor. Both totals update immediately: the complete character count and the count with whitespace removed.

There is no button to press and nothing is uploaded. The counting happens in your browser, so your text is never sent to our server, stored, logged or written into the page address.

Characters with and without spaces

Characters includes every visible character plus spaces, tabs and line breaks. This is the total most forms mean when they give a character limit.

Without spaces removes every kind of whitespace, not only the ordinary space between two words. Tabs and line breaks are removed too. Academic assignments, translation work and publishing systems sometimes ask for this version.

Punctuation and symbols count in both totals. A comma, quotation mark, currency symbol or emoji still occupies a character even though it is not a letter.

Emoji count the way they look

Computers do not always store one visible character as one value. A family emoji can be assembled from several people joined together; a flag is built from two regional symbols; a skin-tone modifier is stored beside the emoji it changes. A simple JavaScript string length reports several characters for each of them.

This counter measures graphemes—the visible characters a person would select or erase as a unit. A family emoji, flag or accented letter therefore counts once when it appears as one character on screen.

Accents and non-Latin writing

An accented letter can be stored in two valid ways: as one precomposed character, or as a plain letter followed by a combining accent. Both render as the same é, and both count as one here.

The same Unicode-aware rule applies to Greek, Cyrillic, Arabic, Hebrew, Devanagari, Chinese, Japanese and other writing systems. Character counting does not depend on spaces between words, so it remains useful for languages where a word counter cannot reliably separate the words.

Why another counter may show a different number

“Character” has more than one technical meaning. A service may count Unicode code points, UTF-16 code units, bytes after encoding, or visible graphemes. It may also treat Windows line breaks as two characters while another system treats them as one.

This tool uses visible graphemes and counts a line break once. That is the most useful rule for writing, but the website receiving your text is the authority on its own limit. If a submission must stay under a hard maximum, leave a small margin rather than aiming for the final character.

Character counts versus word counts

A character limit controls exact space: form fields, database columns, advertisements, titles and metadata. A word limit controls the length of an argument or article and usually allows punctuation and word length to vary.

Use the Word Counter when the requirement is stated in words or when you also need sentences, paragraphs and reading time. Use this Character Counter when every letter, space or symbol matters.

Frequently asked questions

Does the character count include spaces?

The first total includes everything you typed, including spaces, tabs and line breaks. The second removes all whitespace, so you can use whichever rule your form, editor or assignment specifies.

Does an emoji count as one character?

Yes. The counter measures what a person sees rather than the number of pieces used to store it. A single emoji counts once, including joined emoji such as a family, flag or emoji with a skin-tone modifier.

Do accented letters count correctly?

Yes. An accented letter such as é counts as one character even when the underlying text stores the letter and accent separately. The same rule applies across writing systems.

Are line breaks counted as characters?

Yes in the main total. A line break occupies a position in the text just like a space or tab. It is excluded from the "Without spaces" total, which removes every kind of whitespace.

Why can this count differ from a website's limit?

Not every website defines a character the same way. Some count computer code units, some count bytes, and some exclude line breaks. This tool counts user-visible characters. For a strict submission limit, leave a small margin and treat the destination's own counter as final.

How much text can I paste?

There is no fixed server limit because the text never leaves your browser. Essays, product descriptions and long documents count immediately; an extremely large document may respond more slowly while you type, depending on your device.

Is my text uploaded or saved?

No. Counting happens entirely in your browser. The text is not uploaded, stored, logged or written into the page address, and reloading the page clears it.