🏷 HTML ENTITY ENCODER / DECODER

// Encode special characters to HTML entities and decode HTML entities back to text

INPUT

OUTPUT

COMMON HTML ENTITIES

Free HTML Entity Encoder and Decoder — Escape Special Characters Online

Our free HTML encoder and decoder converts special characters like <, >, & and " to their HTML entity equivalents and decodes them back. Essential for web developers preventing XSS vulnerabilities, content authors inserting special characters and anyone working with HTML templates.

Why HTML Encoding Matters for Security

HTML encoding is the primary defence against Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks. If user-supplied input is inserted into HTML without encoding, an attacker can inject script tags and execute malicious JavaScript in a victim's browser. Always encode user input before rendering it in HTML — especially in search results, comments and error messages.

The Five Essential Characters

For HTML security, only five characters require encoding: & (ampersand), < (less than), > (greater than), " (double quote in attributes) and ' (single quote in attributes). Modern UTF-8 pages do not need to encode other characters as named entities.