How To Count Characters Calculator
Character limits are the hard constraints of writing online. Unlike a word count, which is a guide, a character limit truncates, rejects or splits your text the moment you cross it.
Characters
154
- Without spaces
- 129
- Words
- 26
- Lines
- 1
Platform limits
Characters are counted one by one, so an emoji outside the basic multilingual plane counts as two UTF-16 units.
The formula this calculator uses
characters = length of the string, including spaces
- chars
- Every character in the text, spaces included
- noSpaces
- The same text with all whitespace removed
- limit
- The maximum a platform accepts
How to check the result by hand
- 1
Count every character, spaces included
Walk the string and count each code unit. Spaces, commas, apostrophes and newlines all add one.
- 2
Count again without the spaces
Removing whitespace gives the shorter figure some tools report. It is useful for comparing density, not for checking a limit.
- 3
Pick the limit that applies
Use 60 for an SEO title, 160 for a meta description or an SMS, 280 for X, 2,200 for an Instagram caption and 3,000 for a LinkedIn post.
- 4
Subtract to find the room left
Take the limit minus the count. A positive number is spare room, a negative number is how far over the text has run.
- 5
Watch for characters outside the basic set
An emoji or an accented character outside the platform's alphabet can count as two, or can switch an SMS to the shorter encoding and cut the limit.
For worked examples, common mistakes and the limits of this formula, read the full How To Count Characters page.