UTF-8 Decoder
Convert UTF-8 encoded text back to readable format instantly. Perfect for decoding web data, APIs, and encoded documents.
What is UTF-8 Encoding?
UTF-8 is a variable-width character encoding that can represent every character in the Unicode character set. It's the dominant encoding for the web and is backward compatible with ASCII.
Why Use This Decoder?
Our tool quickly converts percent-encoded UTF-8 strings back to readable text, saving you time when working with encoded URLs, form data, or API responses.
Common Use Cases
Decode URLs, form submissions, API data, or encoded text in documents. Essential for web developers, data analysts, and anyone working with encoded text.
Understanding UTF-8 Encoding and Decoding
UTF-8 (Unicode Transformation Format - 8-bit) is the most widely used character encoding on the web. It can represent any Unicode character while remaining backward compatible with ASCII. When text is UTF-8 encoded, special characters and non-ASCII characters are converted into a sequence of bytes, often represented as percent-encoded values in URLs and web applications.
Example of UTF-8 Encoding:
The word "Hello" in UTF-8 percent-encoded format becomes: 48 65 6C 6C 6F
Our decoder tool reverses this process, converting the encoded bytes back to their original characters.
How UTF-8 Encoding Works
UTF-8 uses between 1 and 4 bytes to represent each character. ASCII characters (0-127) use just 1 byte, making it efficient for English text. Other characters require more bytes:
- 1 byte for ASCII characters (0-127)
- 2 bytes for characters in the range U+0080 to U+07FF
- 3 bytes for characters in the range U+0800 to U+FFFF
- 4 bytes for characters in the range U+10000 to U+10FFFF
Check out our URL Decoder tool for more specialized URL decoding functionality.
Frequently Asked Questions
UTF-8 is a character encoding that defines how characters are represented as bytes. URL encoding (percent encoding) is a method to encode bytes for use in URLs, which often involves UTF-8 encoded text. Our tool handles the common case where UTF-8 encoded text has been further percent-encoded for URLs.
Yes, our UTF-8 decoder can handle all valid UTF-8 encoded sequences, including emoji, special symbols, and characters from all writing systems supported by Unicode.
If your text isn't decoding correctly, it might not be UTF-8 encoded, or it might have additional encoding layers. Ensure you're inputting proper percent-encoded UTF-8 text (like %20 for space). If you're working with raw bytes, you might need a different tool.
All processing happens in your browser - no data is sent to our servers. This makes it safe for sensitive information, though we always recommend caution when working with confidential data online.
UTF-8 is variable-width (1-4 bytes per character), UTF-16 uses 2 or 4 bytes per character, and UTF-32 uses 4 bytes for all characters. UTF-8 is most common on the web due to its ASCII compatibility and space efficiency for English text.