Developer utility · text to binary converter
Text to Binary Converter
Convert plain text into its UTF-8 byte representation as binary. ASCII letters use one byte, while characters outside ASCII may use multiple UTF-8 bytes. This makes the page useful for learning encodings, checking protocol samples and preparing byte-oriented test data.
Up to 4,096 characters. No value is sent to a server.
Your conversion results will appear here.
Choose an input format, enter a value and select Convert to see binary, decimal, hex, octal and text results.
Use the tool
How to use this converter
- 1
Keep Text selected and enter the text to encode.
- 2
Select Convert to produce one eight-bit group per UTF-8 byte.
- 3
Copy the binary byte string or compare its other base formats.
Understand the result
How it works
Text is first encoded into UTF-8 bytes. Each byte is formatted as eight binary digits, preserving leading zeroes; for example, H is 01001000 and i is 01101001. ASCII characters keep their familiar one-byte values, but characters such as é and emojis are represented by multiple bytes according to UTF-8.
Practical notes
ASCII is part of UTF-8, not a replacement for it
ASCII defines 128 basic characters, including English letters, digits and control characters. UTF-8 keeps those same values for the ASCII range, so A is the byte 41 in hex and 01000001 in binary. UTF-8 then uses additional byte sequences for characters outside that range.
For example, é is encoded as the two bytes C3 A9, shown in binary as 11000011 10101001. An emoji can use four bytes. Counting characters and counting bytes are therefore not always the same thing, which is important when checking buffer sizes or wire formats.
Practical notes
Why every result uses eight binary digits per byte
The integer value of 72 can be written as 1001000, but the byte representation of the letter H is 01001000. Padding to eight digits prevents adjacent bytes from running together and lets the reverse Binary to Text conversion recover the original sequence.
The converter accepts up to 4,096 input characters and performs the encoding in the browser. It does not treat JavaScript character codes as if they were complete UTF-8 bytes, so non-ASCII text is represented by its actual encoded byte sequence.
- A single ASCII character normally produces one UTF-8 byte.
- A non-ASCII character can produce two, three or four UTF-8 bytes.
- Spaces between byte groups are formatting and do not change the encoded bytes.
Quick reference
Examples
Hi
01001000 01101001
Two UTF-8 bytes
A
01000001
ASCII is one-byte UTF-8
é
11000011 10101001
Two-byte UTF-8 sequence
Common questions
FAQ
What is the binary value of A?
The UTF-8 byte for A is 01000001.
Does text conversion support Unicode?
Yes. It uses UTF-8 bytes, so Unicode characters are encoded correctly instead of being treated as ASCII.
Why are leading zeroes kept in the binary result?
Each byte is displayed as eight digits so byte boundaries remain visible and reversible.
How is é represented in UTF-8 binary?
The character é uses the UTF-8 bytes C3 A9, which are 11000011 10101001 in binary.
Is one text character always one byte?
No. ASCII characters use one byte, while many Unicode characters use multiple UTF-8 bytes.