How to encode or decode a URL
- Choose Encode or Decode.
- Paste your text or URL into the Input box.
- When encoding a complete web address, tick Keep URL structure so characters like
/,?and&stay as they are. - Copy the result.
What URL encoding does
Web addresses can only contain a limited set of characters. Everything else, such as spaces, quotes, accented letters and emoji, has to be written as a percent sign followed by the byte value in hexadecimal:
| Character | Encoded |
|---|---|
| space | %20 |
| & | %26 |
| = | %3D |
| ? | %3F |
| é | %C3%A9 |
This is called percent-encoding. Decoding reverses it, turning %20 back into a space. The decoder also turns + into a space, because HTML forms use + for spaces in query strings.
Encode a value, or a whole URL?
This is the most common mistake. If you're building a link with a search term like apps & games, encode only the value:
https://example.com/search?q=apps%20%26%20games
If you encoded the whole URL with the value already inserted, the & would be treated as the start of a new parameter and the search would break. Use Keep URL structure only when you have a complete address that's already correct apart from a few unsafe characters, such as spaces.
Common uses
- Building share links and deep links for apps.
- Reading tracking links and redirect URLs, which often contain another encoded URL inside them.
- Debugging API requests where parameters aren't arriving as expected.
Related tools
To turn a title into a clean, readable address rather than an encoded one, use the slug generator. For encoding data rather than links, use the Base64 encoder.
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