Character Counter

Type or paste into this character counter and watch the number move with each key. Where's the text headed? Choose it in the menu. Then you see what's left, or by how much you're over.

Press "Try an example" to load a LinkedIn headline. It's 123 characters long. Switch the menu to LinkedIn headline and you'll see 97 left out of 220. Words and sentences get counted too, so you don't need a second tool.

Character limits for every platform (2026)

Every limit in this table is also in the menu above. Read the Note column too. It covers rules that change the count, such as how X counts emoji. It also flags the title tag and meta description rows, which are targets rather than Google limits.

Job-search fields with a character limit

• A LinkedIn connection note is reported at 200 characters on a free account and 300 on Premium. LinkedIn doesn't publish it, so write to 200, reason first. The rest of your profile, and where each field gets cut off by "see more," is covered in our LinkedIn limits guide.
• Your LinkedIn headline gets 220. Put the job you want first. That part gets read before anything else.
• UCAS gives you 4,000 characters over three questions for the personal statement. No answer can be under 350. The UCAS limits guide shows one split that uses all 4,000.
• Some boxes on job application forms stop taking text at their limit, so the end of a long answer won't go in. Choose "Custom limit" above, type the form's number and trim your answer here first.

What each number in the character counter counts

• Characters: everything. Letters, numbers, spaces, punctuation, line breaks. é is one. 👍 is one. A flag or a family emoji? Two or more.
• Without spaces is the same total with spaces, tabs and line breaks taken out.
• Words: whatever sits between spaces or line breaks. "full-time" is one. A hyphen standing alone between spaces gets counted as a word, oddly enough.
• Sentences: anything ending in a period, question mark or exclamation point. "Dr. Lee called." comes out as two, because of the dot after Dr. So take this one as a rough guide.
• Lines: line breaks plus one. Blank lines between paragraphs count.
• Letters: any alphabet, accents and non-Latin scripts too. Digits: just numbers.
• Spaces: spaces and tabs. Not line breaks.
• Bytes (UTF-8): what the text weighs in storage. Plain English letter, 1 byte. Accented, 2. Most emoji, 4.

The case buttons, and what to fix afterward

Title Case capitalizes the first letter of each word and lowercases everything after it. Fine until your text has an acronym or a brand in it. "SQL" turns into "Sql". "iPhone" turns into "Iphone."

Sentence case leaves one capital per sentence, at the start. "Austin" in the middle? Lowercase now. And Title Case trips on apostrophes: "don't" comes back "Don'T". So I press the button and then fix those few words myself.

Remove extra spaces squeezes every run of spaces or tabs down to one and throws out blank lines. I reach for it after copying from a PDF. Those stray spaces add up against a limit.

Cut characters without cutting the point

• Numbers as digits. "3 years" saves 4 characters over "three years."
• "In order to" can almost always be "to." Nine characters back, each time.
• Skip warm-ups like "I am reaching out because". Open with the reason itself.
• Contractions help a little. "Do not" to "don't" is one character back, and "I am" to "I'm" is another.
• Where the tone allows it, "&" for "and" saves 2. I keep that for X and SMS, never a cover letter.
• On X, every link counts as 23 characters, however long it is. A link shortener won't save you anything there.

Characters with or without spaces?

With spaces, unless someone says different. UCAS does say it: its 4,000 includes spaces, so watch the big number. A teacher or client wants it without? That's the second number.

How emoji and accents are counted

Under the hood it counts code points. What that means for you: é or 👍 is one character, while a flag, a skin-tone emoji or a family emoji comes to two or more.

Platforms don't all count this way. X (Twitter) counts every emoji as two, and each Chinese, Japanese or Korean character as two as well. So a post full of emoji reaches 280 sooner than you'd expect.

That byte count at the bottom is UTF-8 size. Rarely needed. Now and then a form sets its limit in bytes, and then it is.

Is my text uploaded?

No. Counting and case changes both happen in your browser. Nothing you type reaches a server. All the page keeps is your chosen limit, so it's there next visit.

FAQ

How many characters can a tweet be in 2026?

On a regular X account, 280. Spaces and punctuation count, emoji count double, and any link is 23. Paying for X Premium? Then 25,000.

How many characters is an Instagram caption?

2,200, hashtags included. The bio is 150. Paste one in, choose its limit from the menu, and you'll know your room.

How long should a meta description be?

There's no Google limit as such. Long ones just get cut to fit the screen. I put the point in sentence one and aim at the 155 preset. Title tags get chopped the same way, so their key words go up front.

How many characters are in one SMS?

160, if every character is in the basic GSM alphabet. Add one emoji, a curly quote or a Chinese character and the phone switches to 16-bit encoding. Now it's 70. Go longer and it's split into parts, and each part can be billed.

Does a line break count as a character?

Yes, one each, here and on X. A blank line between paragraphs is two breaks. So that little gap costs 2.

How many characters is 100 words?

About 600 with spaces, going by six a word (five letters, one space). Yours could be more or less. Paste it and see.

Can I use it as a letter counter?

Yes. Look for Letters under the case buttons. Letters only, any alphabet; digits, spaces and punctuation are skipped. The big Characters number is everything, line breaks and all.

How do I get the character count in Word?

Down at the bottom of the Word window there's a word count. Click it. The Word Count box opens, characters included. Or paste here, where you get with and without spaces beside the platform's limit.