Don't like ads? Go Ad-Free Today 

String Length Calculator Count Characters, Bytes, and Words Instantly

Updated on Feb 26, 2026

Stop guessing character limits. Get instant character count, byte size, word count, and more with our free String Length Calculator — perfect for devs, writers, and data people.

String Length Calculator: Count Characters, Bytes, and Words Instantly 1

ADVERTISEMENT · REMOVE?

Ever pasted a bio into Twitter only to discover you’re 12 characters over the limit? Or built a database column as VARCHAR(255) and then wondered if your user’s input actually fits? Yeah, counting characters by hand is nobody’s idea of a good time. 🙄

Meet the String Length Calculator — your instant, no-nonsense tool for getting every text stat you could possibly need, updated in real time as you type.

What Does It Actually Do?

Paste in any text and you’ll immediately see:

Character Count — total characters, spaces included
Characters (No Spaces) — because some platforms don’t count whitespace
Byte Count (UTF-8) — crucial for database limits and API payloads
Word Count — for writers, SEO folks, and anyone with a word limit
Line Count — handy for config files, CSVs, and log analysis

Everything updates instantly. No submit button, no page reload, no waiting. Just type and know.

Why Byte Count Matters More Than You Think

Here’s the thing most people miss: character count ≠ byte count. A plain ASCII letter like “A” is 1 byte. But an emoji like 🎉 can be 4 bytes. And if you’re storing text in a database with a byte-based limit (hello, MySQL’s VARCHAR), you need to know the byte size, not just the character count.

Our String Length Calculator gives you the UTF-8 byte size right alongside the character count, so you’ll never accidentally truncate someone’s emoji-laden username again. 💀

Who Needs This?

Developers: Validating input lengths, checking API payload sizes, debugging encoding issues. You know the drill — a field says “max 100 characters” but the backend actually means 100 bytes.

Writers & Marketers: Twitter bios (160 chars), meta descriptions (~155 chars), SMS messages (160 chars), ad copy limits. The Word Counter is great for longer content, but when you need raw character precision, this is the tool.

Data People: Checking CSV field sizes before import, verifying log line lengths, making sure your data fits the schema. Pair it with the Line Counter for a full text breakdown.

Real-World Scenarios

The SMS Budget Check: Writing an SMS campaign? Standard SMS is 160 characters (or 70 for Unicode). Paste your message in, check the count, and trim before you blow through your messaging credits.

The Database Sanity Check: About to insert a string into a VARCHAR(255) column? Check the byte count first. That “short” Japanese text might be 3x the bytes you expect.

The Commit Message Audit: Git best practices say 50 chars for the subject line. Paste it in. Are you at 50 or 78? Now you know. 🔥

Copy Any Stat With One Click

Need to drop the character count into a Jira ticket or Slack message? Each stat has a copy button right next to it. Click, paste, done. No highlighting, no accidental extra spaces.

Related Tools

If you’re working with text, these might come in handy too:

Word Counter — detailed word and reading time stats
Line Counter — count lines in any text or file
Case Converter — uppercase, lowercase, title case in one click
Whitespace Trimmer — clean up messy text fast
Encode Text to Base64 — when you need to see what your string looks like encoded

Go Count Some Strings

Stop guessing, stop counting on your fingers, and definitely stop getting burned by byte vs. character limits. The String Length Calculator is free, instant, and works right in your browser. Go give it a spin. ⚡