URL encoding replaces characters that are not allowed in a URL with a percent sign and two hex digits for each UTF-8 byte. A space becomes %20, an ampersand %26, and café becomes caf%C3%A9 because é is two bytes. Decoding reverses it, turning %C3%A9 back into é.
Query strings break when a value contains an ampersand, a space or a non-English letter, and log files and redirect links are full of %XX sequences nobody can read. This converter handles both directions. Encode a single value when you are building a query parameter, encode a full URL when you only need spaces and accented characters fixed without breaking the slashes and question mark, or decode an escaped string to see what it says. The counts show how many escapes were involved, and a warning appears when text looks double-encoded. One limit: it does not convert international domain names to punycode, so a host such as münchen.de is percent-escaped rather than turned into its xn-- form.
Choose Encode a value for one parameter, Encode a full URL to keep its structure, or Decode.
Type or paste into the box, or open a .txt file from your device.
Tick the + option when the string comes from or goes to an HTML form, where spaces are written as +.
The converted text and the escape count update while you type; copy the result into your link or code.
Result Result: caf%C3%A9
Input characters: 4
Output characters: 9
Percent escapes: 2
The é is two bytes in UTF-8, so it becomes two escapes, %C3%A9, while the plain letters stay as they are.
Result Result: https://example.com/my%20file.pdf?q=1
Input characters: 35
Output characters: 37
Percent escapes: 1
Full-URL mode keeps the colon, slashes, ? and = so the link still works, and only the space becomes %20.
Result Result: naïve café
Input characters: 20
Output characters: 10
Percent escapes: 4
With form encoding on, the + becomes a space and each pair of escapes turns back into one accented letter.
each byte b of the UTF-8 form of a reserved or non-ASCII character → % followed by b in two hex digits
b%XXRFC 3986 allows letters, digits and – . _ ~ in a URL as they are. Value mode escapes everything else except ! * ' ( ), which matches JavaScript's encodeURIComponent. Full-URL mode also keeps the delimiters : / ? # @ & = + $ ; , so the address keeps its shape. Decoding groups consecutive escapes and reads them as UTF-8; a lone %E9 is rejected because it is not a complete UTF-8 character.
Both mean a space, but in different places. %20 is the RFC 3986 escape and works anywhere in a URL. The + comes from the HTML form format application/x-www-form-urlencoded and is only read as a space in query strings and form bodies. In a path, + is a literal plus sign.
Escapes encode bytes, not characters. Modern URLs use UTF-8, where é takes two bytes (C3 A9), Arabic letters take two, most Chinese characters take three and emoji take four. So 😀 becomes %F0%9F%98%80.
In older Latin-1 pages %E9 meant é, but on its own it is not a complete UTF-8 character. The decoder reads escapes as UTF-8, as browsers do today, so it reports the problem rather than inventing a character. The UTF-8 form of é is %C3%A9.
Letters A to Z and a to z, digits 0 to 9, and the marks – _ . ! ~ * ' ( ). Everything else, including space, &, =, ?, / and #, is escaped so it cannot be mistaken for part of the URL structure.
Look for %25 followed by two hex digits, such as %2520. %25 is the escape for the percent sign itself. After one decode the result still contains %XX sequences, and the tool shows a warning so you can decode again.
No. Encoding and decoding run in your browser with the same functions browsers use for links, and nothing you paste is uploaded or stored.
Using this tool in an assignment, article or report? Copy a citation, or a link for your website.
Tools Directory Editorial Team. (2026, October 12). URL Encode Decode. Tools Directory. Retrieved October 26, 2026, from https://tools.milunir.com/converters/text-encoding/url-encode-decode/
Tools Directory Editorial Team. “URL Encode Decode.” Tools Directory, 12 Oct. 2026, https://tools.milunir.com/converters/text-encoding/url-encode-decode/. Accessed 26 Oct. 2026.
Tools Directory Editorial Team. “URL Encode Decode.” Tools Directory. Last modified October 12, 2026. Accessed October 26, 2026. https://tools.milunir.com/converters/text-encoding/url-encode-decode/.
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