Character Counter
Live character count with handy social media limit presets.
What is the Character Counter?
This tool counts every character in your text, with and without spaces, and updates live as you type. It also includes quick preset limits for common platforms — SMS messages, X (Twitter) posts, SEO meta descriptions and Instagram captions — so you can see exactly how many characters you have left before you hit a hard limit.
How to use it
- Type or paste your text into the box.
- Click a preset button to track your remaining allowance for that platform, or leave it on "No limit" for a plain count.
- The remaining counter turns negative once you go over the limit, so you know exactly how much to trim.
Character counting matters in places where word count alone does not tell the full story: SMS gateways bill per 160-character segment, X enforces a strict 280-character cap, and search engines truncate meta descriptions around 155-160 characters. Because the counter runs entirely in your browser using plain JavaScript, nothing you type is uploaded or stored anywhere, making it safe for drafts you have not published yet. Every emoji, space and punctuation mark counts as a character, matching how most platforms measure length internally.