Translate text to binary and back

How text becomes binary

Each character is stored as one or more bytes, and each byte is a number from 0 to 255, which takes eight binary digits. Text Studio uses UTF-8, where the plain English letters, digits and punctuation take one byte each, the same as in the older ASCII code:

Letters with accents take two bytes and most emoji four, which is why the byte count under the result can be larger than the number of characters. Translators that treat each character as a single number get these wrong on the way back; UTF-8 does not.

Reading binary, hex and decimal

Paste binary on the page and the panel recognizes it on its own and shows Binary to text. Bytes may be separated by spaces, commas or line breaks, or run together in one long string of 0s and 1s, which is split every eight digits.

Hex, decimal and octal look like ordinary numbers, so the panel reads them only when that kind is chosen: pick Hex and paste 48 69, and it shows Hi. Prefixes such as 0x and \x are understood. Numbers that would not make readable text, such as a list of prices, stay as text, and if you really mean to translate them, Make hex of it instead does that.

Which one to use

• Binary shows the bits themselves, for lessons, puzzles and messages that look like computer code.
• Hex is how programmers read bytes: two digits per byte, as in a hex editor or a %C3%A9 in a web address.
• Decimal gives the byte values as everyday numbers, 0 to 255.
• Octal uses three digits per byte, 000 to 377, as some older systems and file permissions do.

To convert a single number between bases, rather than text, use the number base converter in the Dev Toolbox. For data that has to travel as plain characters, such as a file in an email, Base64 is the usual choice.