JSON Escape / Unescape

Overview

Escapes raw text into a valid JSON string literal — surrounding quotes included — and unescapes such a literal back into raw text. When an API rejects a payload because a string contains a raw newline or an unescaped quote, this is the fix.

How It Works

Pick the direction with the toggle: Escape → JSON string turns whatever you paste into a quoted, escaped literal; Unescape ← JSON string does the reverse and even accepts input without the surrounding quotes. The result updates live, and invalid escapes in unescape mode surface JSON.parse's own error message.

Step-by-Step Usage Guide

1. Choose Escape or Unescape with the toggle.
2. Paste the raw text or the escaped literal.
3. Read the converted result — in unescape mode, quotes around the input are optional.
4. Copy the result into your code, config, or payload.

Technical Specifications & Standards

Escaping is delegated to JSON.stringify, the specification's own encoder: backslash and double quote get a backslash, newline, carriage return, tab, backspace, and form feed get their short forms, and the remaining control characters become \u00XX. Unescaping is JSON.parse — the specification's decoder — which additionally understands \/ and \uXXXX four-digit forms. Non-ASCII characters such as é or 中文 pass through literally in both directions; the tool never rewrites them to \uXXXX.

Targeted Use Cases

• Embedding user-supplied text inside a JSON payload without the first quote or newline breaking the string.
• Decoding \n-escaped strings copied out of API logs or stack traces.
• Preparing single-line string values for JSON config files, where a literal line break would be invalid.
• Round-tripping generated JSON snippets to check nothing was double-escaped.

Notes & Gotchas

• Escape output includes the surrounding double quotes, because a JSON string literal is defined to have them. Strip them if your context supplies its own quoting.
• Unescape accepts input with or without surrounding quotes — anything that does not start with one is wrapped for you before parsing.
• Unicode is preserved as-is: é stays é rather than becoming \u00e9. If you need ASCII-only output, escape it in a separate step.
• Errors are JSON.parse's own messages, shown inline with a ✗ prefix — an invalid \u sequence is the usual culprit in pasted log fragments.

Frequently Asked Questions