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Remove Special Characters

Strip symbols and special characters, keeping only the characters you choose.

  • Free
  • Real-time
  • Runs locally
Updates as you type
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What to keep

Removed characters

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Kept

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Distinct

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Removed characters

0 removed

Removed characters

Nothing removed yet.

Strip symbols like @, #, $, %, &, *, brackets and other special characters from any text. By default only letters, numbers, spaces and line breaks are kept, which is exactly what you need for clean names, IDs, keywords and data imports.

You decide what stays: keep basic punctuation for readable sentences, keep emoji, limit letters to plain A–Z, or list your own characters to keep, such as @ and . for email addresses. A summary shows every character that was removed. It all runs in your browser.

01

How to remove special characters

  1. STEP 01

    Paste your text

    Paste any text, list or data. The cleaned result appears below as you type.

  2. STEP 02

    Choose what to keep

    Pick which kinds of characters stay, and add any extra characters you need to keep.

  3. STEP 03

    Copy the result

    Check the removed characters, then copy or download the cleaned text.

02

Features

  • Keep what you choose

    Letters, numbers, spaces, line breaks, basic punctuation and emoji can each be kept or removed.

  • Plain A–Z option

    Keep only English letters to produce ASCII-safe text for systems that reject other characters.

  • Custom allow list

    Type characters that must always stay, like @ . _ - for emails, usernames or file names.

  • Delete or replace

    Delete special characters outright or replace each with a space so words do not run together.

  • Removed character report

    See every character that was removed and how often, including invisible ones shown by code.

  • Accent and emoji safe

    Accented letters and multi-part emoji are handled as whole characters, never broken apart.

03

Common uses

A few examples of what this tool is good for:

  • Cleaning product names, IDs or SKUs before importing them into a spreadsheet or database.
  • Turning “Hello, World! #2026” into “Hello World 2026” for keywords and tags.
  • Making file names or usernames safe by keeping only letters, numbers and characters like _ and -.
  • Removing stray symbols and invisible characters that break forms, searches or code.
04

Frequently asked questions

What counts as a special character?

Anything that is not a letter, number, space or line break, such as @ # $ % & * + = / \ | < > [ ] { }, as well as punctuation, emoji and invisible control characters. You can keep any of these groups with the options.

How do I keep punctuation like periods and commas?

Turn on Basic punctuation. Periods, commas, question and exclamation marks, quotes, brackets and hyphens are then kept.

Can I keep a specific symbol, like @ or #?

Yes. Type the characters in “Always keep these characters”, for example @ and . to keep email addresses intact.

Will accented letters like é be removed?

No, letters from every language are kept by default. Turn on “Only English letters (A–Z)” to remove them, or use our Remove Accents tool to convert é to e instead.

Why are words joined together after removing characters?

Characters like slashes or underscores may separate words. Choose “Replace with space” to put a space where each character was removed.

Is my text uploaded?

No. Characters are removed in your browser and nothing is sent to a server.

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