Html Entities

Free online tool. All processing is client-side. No signup needed.

How to Use the Html Entities

1. Enter your input values above
2. Results update automatically
3. Copy or download the output

What is a Html Entities?

An HTML Entities tool encodes and decodes HTML entities — the special character sequences used in HTML to represent reserved characters and symbols that can't be typed directly. The most common examples: &amp; for & (since & has special meaning in HTML), &lt; for < (opening tag delimiters), &gt; for >, &quot; for double quotes inside attributes, and &nbsp; for a non-breaking space. This tool handles the full range of HTML entities including named entities (&copy; → ©), decimal numeric entities (&#169; → ©), and hex entities (&#xA9; → ©).

How Does It Work?

Paste text and choose encode (text → HTML-safe with entities) or decode (HTML entities → readable text). The encoder replaces &, <, >, \

Formula

Minimal Required Escaping (prevents XSS):\n• & → &amp;\n• < → &lt;\n• > → &gt;\n• \

Who Uses This Tool?

• Web developers escaping user input before rendering in HTML (XSS prevention)
• Content authors inserting special characters (©, ™, €, ½, ←, ∞)
• Email HTML developers encoding variables in email template engines
• Technical SEO: using entities for structured data and rich snippets
• Anyone who's seen '&amp;amp;' in raw HTML and wondered how to fix it

Pro Tips

• The most critical security rule: escape ALL user-supplied data before rendering it as HTML. This is the #1 defense against Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks
• For displaying code examples in HTML (like `<div>`), you must encode the < and > characters. Many blogging platforms do this automatically
• Avoid regex-based HTML entity decoding in production code — use the browser's built-in parser or a well-tested library. HTML entities have edge cases (numeric ranges, case sensitivity)
• Double-encoding is a common bug: if you see '&amp;amp;', the text has been encoded twice. Decode once to get '&amp;', twice for '&'

Frequently Asked Questions about Html Entities

Which HTML entities must always be escaped?

Five characters: &amp; (always — it starts all other entities), &lt; and &gt; (tag delimiters — unescaped creates unintentional HTML), &quot; (inside double-quoted attributes), and &#x27; (inside single-quoted attributes). For safety, escape all five whenever outputting user data as HTML.

How do I prevent XSS attacks?

Always encode user input before rendering as HTML. Use Content Security Policy (CSP) headers. Never insert user data into <script> tags or event handlers (onclick, onerror). Use frameworks with auto-escaping (React, Vue, Angular). Our tool helps by encoding text correctly.

Free online Html Entities — no signup, 100% client-side processing. All data stays in your browser.