Unicode Text Inspector

What this tool is for

Unicode Text Inspector helps you identify invisible or combined characters without silently changing the source. Processing happens in the current browser session, so the normal workflow does not require uploading the text to BiNotePads.

How to use Unicode Text Inspector

1. Enter or paste the source data and keep an untouched copy when the order or formatting matters.
2. Choose the available options, then select Process.
3. Review the entire result before copying, downloading, publishing or importing it elsewhere.

Tell a visible symbol from its underlying characters

Try this small sample before using your own text.

Sample input or options

A é👩‍💻

What to check in the result

9 UTF-16 units; 7 code points; 4 graphemes on a supporting browser; 17 UTF-8 bytes.

Before you use the output

The output identifies U+00A0 as NO-BREAK SPACE, U+0301 as a combining mark, and U+200D as a zero-width joiner. NFC is no because the accented e uses two code points. The tool reports the source without removing or normalizing it. It lists the first 1,000 code points while totals cover the full accepted input.

Read the counts before changing text

A visible symbol can contain more than one Unicode code point. This is common with an accented letter written as a base letter plus a combining mark, and with joined emoji. UTF-16 units describe JavaScript string storage; UTF-8 bytes describe encoding size. The four totals answer different questions, so use the measure required by the destination.

Locate an invisible character

Select Try the example to load and process a harmless sample. In the detail report, find NO-BREAK SPACE, COMBINING MARK and ZERO WIDTH JOINER. The code-point index starts at one; the UTF-16 offset starts at zero. Offsets refer to the current textarea value. Browsers can normalize pasted line endings, so this is not an exact-byte file inspector.

NFC and NFD indicate whether the current string is already in those normalization forms. The source is not transformed. Do not automatically delete joiners, combining marks or direction controls: they can be meaningful in real languages. This report does not identify every visually similar character or prove that a name is safe.

Input and output limits

Use at most 250,000 UTF-16 units. Detail is limited to the first 1,000 code points, while totals use all accepted text. Older browsers without Intl.Segmenter show grapheme count as unavailable; the tool does not silently substitute code points. An unpaired surrogate is labelled explicitly; TextEncoder replaces it during UTF-8 encoding.

For the API definitions, see Intl.Segmenter and Unicode normalization. To measure an ordinary draft instead, use the word counter.

Common uses

• Diagnosing surprising character counts
• Locating no-break and zero-width characters
• Checking text copied between editors

Limits and accuracy

Grapheme boundaries follow the browser implementation; this is not a confusable-name detector, font inspector or automatic cleaner. Keep the original text, verify important results and use a specialized application when a task carries legal, security, financial or production risk.

Privacy and safety

This tool is intended for ordinary text and development samples. Do not paste passwords, authentication tokens, private keys, payment information, medical records or confidential client data into a general-purpose web page. Closing or refreshing the page can remove unsaved input.

Frequently asked questions