Character counter

Characters with spaces is the number nearly every form and platform means. It updates below as you type, with the without-spaces figure directly beneath it.

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Numbers appear here once you add text.

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With spaces or without?

Two different numbers answer to the name “character count”, and picking the wrong one is the most common reason a submission gets rejected for length.

With spaces is the default almost everywhere: social platforms, meta tags, SMS, application forms, database fields. Every space, tab and line break counts as one character. Without spaces shows up mainly in translation and typesetting, where the count prices the work rather than fitting a field.

If a form says “maximum 500 characters” with no further detail, it means with spaces. Use the large number.

What counts as one character

A character is a single unit of text as the computer stores it, not a single letter you can see.

Spaces, tabs and line breaks each count as one character.
Punctuation and symbols count: commas, em dashes, currency symbols, hash marks.
Accented letters such as é or ü count as one.
Emoji are the exception. Many take two or more units of storage, and some platforms charge you for all of them. Our count matches how most web forms measure.

Character limits worth knowing

These are the ceilings people hit most often.

Where	Limit	Note
Title tag (SEO)	~60 characters	Pixel width, not character count, decides truncation
Meta description	~155 characters	Rewritten by Google most of the time anyway
X / Twitter post	280 characters	Higher for paid accounts
SMS, single message	160 characters	70 if any non-Latin character is present
Instagram caption	2,200 characters	Only the first ~125 show before “more”
LinkedIn post	3,000 characters	First ~140 visible in feed
YouTube title	100 characters	Truncates around 60 in most surfaces

Common questions

Does a space count as a character?

Yes. In the standard with-spaces measure every space is one character, and so is every tab and line break. That is why a paragraph with generous spacing can hit a limit sooner than expected.

Why does my emoji count as two characters?

Most systems store text as UTF-16, where common characters take one unit and emoji take two. Some emoji built from several parts, such as flags or skin-tone variants, take more still. Platforms differ in how they charge you, so test against the real field for anything close to a limit.

What is the difference between a character and a letter?

Letters are only the alphabetic characters. Characters include everything: letters, digits, punctuation, symbols and whitespace. The panel shows both.