Character counter
Count characters as you type, and check your text against the limit you’re writing for.
Limits at a glance
| Where | Limit | Good to know |
|---|---|---|
| X (Twitter) post | 280 | X counts emoji and Chinese, Japanese or Korean characters as two, and any link as 23. |
| Text message (SMS) | 160 | 160 plain characters per message, or 70 if it has an emoji or an accent outside the basic set. Longer texts are sent in parts. |
| Meta description | 155 | Google usually shows about 150–160 characters of a description before cutting it off. |
| Page title | 60 | Google usually shows about 50–60 characters of a title. |
| Instagram caption | 2,200 | Only the first 125 or so show before “more”. |
| LinkedIn post | 3,000 | About the first 210 show before “see more”. |
| YouTube title | 100 | Shorter titles are easier to read in search results. |
| YouTube description | 5,000 | The first two or three lines show above “more”. |
Counting words instead? The word counter shows words, sentences, paragraphs and reading time.
Questions
Do spaces count as characters?
Yes: spaces, punctuation and line breaks are characters, and most limits (X, Instagram, meta descriptions) count them. The count without spaces is shown too.
Why does X say my post is longer than this?
X counts some characters twice, including emoji and Chinese, Japanese and Korean characters, and counts every link as 23 characters whatever its real length. Choose the X limit and the counter does the same.
Why does an emoji make my text message so much shorter?
A text message holds 160 characters from the basic GSM set (English letters, digits and common punctuation). One emoji or an accented letter outside that set switches the whole message to another encoding that fits only 70. Longer messages are split into parts of 153 (or 67), and each part may be charged as a separate message.
Is an emoji one character?
In the main count, yes: an emoji, a flag or an accented letter counts as one, as you see it. Under the hood some are several code points, which is why X and text messages count them differently.
Is my text sent anywhere?
No. Everything is counted in your browser, and your text is kept only in this tab.
More text tools
- Word counterWords, characters, sentences, reading time and keywords.
- Case converterUPPER, lower, Title Case, Sentence case and more.
- Remove line breaksJoin lines broken by a PDF or an email.
- Remove extra spacesSingle spaces, trimmed lines, no runs of blank lines.
- Remove duplicate linesKeep the first of each repeated line.
- Sort linesAlphabetical, by length, reversed or shuffled.