ENCODE & DECODE / URL

URL

URL encoding transforms special characters into a web-safe format using percent signs and hexadecimal values. Whether you're building APIs, handling form submissions, or debugging query parameters, this tool helps you quickly encode and decode URLs to ensure they transmit correctly across the internet.

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OUTPUT
Encoded text will appear here
ABOUT URL ENCODING

URL encoding converts characters into a format that can be transmitted over the Internet. Special characters are replaced with percent-encoded values.

Why URL encoding matters: Web browsers and servers communicate using the HTTP protocol, which has strict rules about which characters can appear in URLs. Characters like spaces, ampersands, equal signs, and non-ASCII characters need encoding to avoid breaking the URL structure or causing security vulnerabilities. For example, a space becomes %20, an ampersand becomes %26, and a plus sign becomes %2B.

Common uses: Query string parameters, form data encoding, special character escaping, internationalized URLs.

Technical note: This tool uses JavaScript's native encodeURIComponent() and decodeURIComponent() functions, which follow the URI specification and handle UTF-8 encoding correctly. It's more comprehensive than the older escape() function and properly encodes characters like /, ?, &, =, and @ that have special meaning in URLs.