"category": "dev-utility",
URL Encoder
"tldr": Paste text and get it percent-encoded for safe use in URLs - spaces, &, ?, and unicode handled correctly.
Percent-encode text so it can travel safely inside a URL: spaces become %20, & becomes %26, and non-ASCII characters are UTF-8 encoded byte by byte (é becomes %C3%A9). The output matches JavaScript's encodeURIComponent - the strict encoding correct for query-parameter values.
Un-encoded special characters are a classic bug source: an & inside a parameter value silently splits it into two parameters, a # truncates everything after it, and a + may or may not become a space depending on the server. Encoding values before assembling URLs eliminates the whole class.
How to URL-encode text
- 1Paste the raw text - typically a query-parameter value.
- 2Every character unsafe in URLs is converted to %XX percent-encoding.
- 3Unicode is encoded as UTF-8 bytes, the standard all modern servers expect.
- 4Paste the result into your URL after the = of the parameter.
Convert Text to URL-encoded in code
const url = `/search?q=${encodeURIComponent(query)}`;
// or let URLSearchParams do it:
const params = new URLSearchParams({ q: query }).toString();from urllib.parse import quote, urlencode
quote("coffee & cream") # 'coffee%20%26%20cream'
urlencode({"q": "coffee & cream"}) # 'q=coffee+%26+cream'Frequently asked questions
Should I encode the whole URL or just the values?
Just the parts that are data: parameter values and dynamic path segments. Encoding the whole URL turns the structural characters (:, /, ?, &) into literals and breaks it - the equivalent of JavaScript's encodeURI vs encodeURIComponent distinction. This tool is the strict, per-value variant.
Space: %20 or +?
%20 is always correct. + means space only in the application/x-www-form-urlencoded convention (HTML form bodies and, historically, query strings) - in a path segment a + is a literal plus. Emitting %20 everywhere is the unambiguous choice.
Why is my value double-encoded (%2520)?
%2520 is %20 encoded again - the % became %25. It happens when two layers both encode (your code and an HTTP library). Encode exactly once, at the point where you assemble the URL, and pass raw values everywhere else.
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