UTILS.
Private by default
🔤

Source-Code String Escaper / Unescaper

Escape or unescape text as a string literal for Java, C#, C/C++, JavaScript, JSON, SQL, or XML/HTML — one tool, seven languages, all in-browser.

Your files stay on this device

Files are processed in your browser, never uploaded. The site downloads code and assets to run the tools. No accounts or trackers.

Use Download to save this tool as one HTML file for offline use.

Privacy →
— output appears here —

About this tool

The Source-Code String Escaper / Unescaper turns arbitrary text into a safe string literal for the programming language you pick, or reverses a literal back into plain text. It is the quickly-needed helper for pasting a multi-line block, a path, or text containing quotes into source code without breaking it. Everything runs in your browser as a pure string transform; nothing is uploaded.

Each language uses its own escape table. JavaScript and JSON escape backslash, double-quote, and the control set (\n \r \t \b \f) and emit \uXXXX for other control or non-ASCII characters. Java uses the same C-style set with \uXXXX over UTF-16 code units. C, C++ and C# add \0 \a \v and \xHH for bytes. SQL doubles single quotes ('' ), the ANSI-standard way to embed a quote in a string literal. XML/HTML replaces & < > " ' with &amp; &lt; &gt; &quot; &apos; and emits &#nnn; for other non-printable characters.

Unescape reverses the same tables: it parses \n, \t, \xHH, \uXXXX and \u{...} sequences for the C-family languages, collapses doubled quotes for SQL, and resolves named and numeric (&#nnn; / &#xHH;) entities for XML/HTML. Choose the target language and whether to escape or unescape. This tool is broader than the JSON-only and HTML-only escapers — it covers all seven targets in one place.

Frequently asked questions

Which languages are supported?
JavaScript, JSON, Java, C#, C/C++, SQL, and XML/HTML. Each uses its own escape rules — for example \uXXXX for JavaScript/Java/JSON, \xHH and \0 for C-family, doubled single quotes for SQL, and named plus numeric entities for XML/HTML.
How does it handle non-ASCII characters?
For JavaScript, JSON, and Java it emits \uXXXX (with surrogate pairs for characters above U+FFFF). C and C# can use \xHH for bytes. XML/HTML leaves printable Unicode as-is and only escapes the five markup characters plus control codes as &#nnn;.
Can it reverse an escaped string?
Yes. Switch the direction to Unescape and it parses the language's escape sequences back to plain text — \uXXXX, \xHH, \u{...}, doubled SQL quotes, and named or numeric HTML/XML entities are all decoded.
How is this different from the JSON or HTML escaper?
Those handle a single format. This tool covers seven language targets in one place with their distinct escape tables, so you can escape the same text for a Java literal, a SQL string, or an XML attribute without switching tools.

More tools

File Checksum (WASM)JSON to TypeScriptXML FormatterSQL FormatterHTML MinifierCSS MinifierAll 61 Developer tools →