Character Counter

What the Character Counter Does

Lots of places cap your text — a 160-character SMS, a 280-character post, a meta description around 155 — and the only thing that matters is the count. This tool puts it front and centre, updating as you trim, with the no-spaces figure right beside it for platforms that ignore spaces.

It is the same engine as our word counter and shows the same seven figures; the character counter simply leads with the two character totals, the ones you watch when a limit is the goal.

How It Works

The total character count is the length of your text exactly as written, spaces and line breaks included. The no-spaces count takes the same text and removes every whitespace character first, then counts what is left.

Words, sentences, and paragraphs are tallied alongside — words by splitting on whitespace, sentences by end punctuation, paragraphs by blank lines — and reading and speaking times come from the word count at fixed paces.

Methodology

1. Step 1. Type or paste your text — it stays in your browser, never uploaded.
2. Step 2. Characters = the text's exact length, including spaces and line breaks.
3. Step 3. No-spaces = the length after removing every space, tab, and line break.
4. Step 4. Words, sentences, and paragraphs are counted at the same time.
5. Step 5. All figures update live with every keystroke.

The two character counts

Whitespace means spaces, tabs, and line breaks. Most emoji and some accented letters are built from multiple code units, so they can add more than one to the character total.

Assumptions

• Characters are counted as the text's length in code units, so a multi-code-point emoji can count as 2 or more.
• No-spaces removes spaces, tabs, and line breaks — not punctuation, which still counts.
• Words are whitespace-separated runs; reading time assumes 200 wpm and speaking time 130 wpm.
• Platform limits vary in how they count, so use this as a general guide and confirm on the platform.

Technical Details

Standards & references

• Character (code unit) counting — the total is the string's length; characters outside the basic range, including many emoji, are made of multiple code units and add more than one.
• Common limits — for reference: SMS around 160 characters, a classic tweet 280, a meta description around 155–160 — though each platform counts in its own way.

Accuracy & Limitations

Both character counts are exact for how they are defined — total length, and length with whitespace stripped. They are the right tool for hitting a limit, as long as you know which figure the platform uses.

Counting is by code unit, so most emoji and some accented or non-Latin characters count as more than one. A platform may count those differently (some treat an emoji as a single character, others as several), so confirm against the platform for a hard cap.

The word, sentence, and paragraph figures alongside are counted the same way as in the word counter — words by whitespace, sentences by end punctuation, paragraphs by blank lines — so the sentence count is a heuristic.

Reading and speaking times are estimates from 200 and 130 words per minute and will vary with the reader and the material.

Real-World Use Cases

When to use it — and when not to

For a single platform's hard limit, verify there; for word-level stats, the word counter shows the same panel led by words.

Frequently Asked Questions

References

• String: length — MDN
• How many words do we read per minute? Brysbaert meta-analysis (ScienceDirect)

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