HTML Entities
Encode special characters to entities — or decode them back
HTML Entities — Complete Guide & Instructions
MakeCard HTML Entities converts special characters into safe HTML entity codes — and decodes them back — instantly. Paste text containing <, >, &, quotes, or accented letters and get properly escaped output; an option also encodes non-ASCII characters into numeric entities like é. Developers and content editors use it to embed code snippets and symbols in pages without breaking markup.
How to Use HTML Entities
- 1 Pick Encode → or ← Decode mode with the toggle buttons.
- 2 When encoding, tick "Also encode non-ASCII chars" if you want é → é style output.
- 3 Paste your text or entities into the textarea.
- 4 Copy the result from the output box — or press ⇅ Swap & continue to feed it back for the reverse operation.
Key Features & Capabilities
- Two-way conversion: text → entities and entities → text.
- Escapes markup-critical characters: < > & and quotes.
- Optional full non-ASCII encoding to numeric entities.
- Swap button reverses direction while keeping the text.
- One-click copy of the converted output.
Supported Formats & Specifications
| Parameter | Specification |
|---|---|
| Modes | Encode and decode |
| Encoding | Named/numeric entities for markup chars; optional non-ASCII → &#nnn; |
| Output | Escaped or unescaped text, copy-ready |
Practical Everyday Use Cases
- Displaying code samples in a blog post without the browser executing them.
- Safely embedding user text containing <, >, or & in HTML pages.
- Decoding entity-heavy text copied from a webpage's source.
- Converting accented characters to numeric entities for older systems.
Pro Tips for Best Results
- Always encode &, <, > when showing HTML source inside an HTML page — otherwise the browser parses it as real markup.
- Use the non-ASCII option for maximum compatibility in old email templates and legacy encodings.
- Decode first when cleaning up double-encoded text like &lt;.
Common Problems & Solutions
The text was already encoded once — switch to Decode mode to flatten it back before re-encoding.
Ensure the input contains valid entities like < or < — plain angle brackets are not entities.
Privacy & Security
100% Client-Side Execution
Conversion happens entirely in your browser — text and code snippets are never transmitted or stored.
Frequently Asked Questions
Everything you need to know about using HTML Entities
Paste your text, choose Encode mode, and the result contains safe entities — < becomes <, & becomes &, and so on.
Encode it first with this tool — escaping < and > stops the browser interpreting your snippet as real tags.
& — ampersand is the most important character to escape because every entity starts with it.
Yes — decode mode converts both named entities (é) and numeric ones (é) back to their characters.
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