Invisible Character Remover
Find and remove zero-width spaces and other hidden characters in your text.
Runs in your browser. Nothing you enter is uploaded.
How to use Invisible Character Remover
- Paste your text. Text from websites, Word, PDFs, chat apps and AI tools often hides characters you can’t see.
- Read the line above the result: it lists every hidden character that was found, by name.
- Choose "Show where they are" to see each one marked in place, like ⟨ZWSP⟩.
- Choose whether non-breaking and other special spaces become normal spaces or stay.
- Copy the clean text, or download it as a .txt file.
Examples
Text copied from a web page
- Hidden characters: Remove them
OnlyNBSP$20ZWSP/month.ZWSP CancelNBSPanytime.
Only $20/month. Cancel anytime.
The zero-width spaces are removed and the non-breaking spaces become normal ones. The text looks the same, but search, copy and paste now behave.
Find what breaks a password or code
- Hidden characters: Show where they are
passZWSPwordSHY2026BOM
pass⟨ZWSP⟩word⟨SHY⟩2026⟨BOM⟩
Each hidden character is replaced with its short name, so you can see where it was.
Text from an AI chat, with emoji
- Hidden characters: Remove them
The trip is 42NNBSPkm long. Family: 👨👩👧
The trip is 42 km long. Family: 👨👩👧
The narrow no-break space becomes a normal space. The joiners inside the family emoji stay, so it doesn’t fall apart into three faces.
How it works
Your text is checked character by character in your browser. Nothing is uploaded. Every hidden character is listed by name above the result, and Show where they are replaces each one with a short label so you can see exactly where it was.
| What it finds | Label | What happens |
|---|---|---|
| Zero-width space | ZWSP | Removed |
| Byte order mark | BOM | Removed |
| Soft hyphen | SHY | Removed |
| Word joiner and invisible math characters | WJ | Removed |
| Non-breaking space | NBSP | Made a normal space, or kept |
| Narrow no-break, thin, en, em and other special spaces | NNBSP, THSP… | Made normal spaces, or kept |
| Line and paragraph separators | LS, PS | Made normal line breaks |
| Text direction marks and overrides | LRM, RLM, DIR | Removed, unless the text has Arabic or Hebrew letters |
| Zero-width joiner and non-joiner | ZWJ, ZWNJ | Removed, unless an emoji or a word needs them |
| Variation selectors | VS16… | Removed, unless an emoji or a Chinese or Japanese character needs them |
| Tag characters | TAG | Removed, unless they’re part of a flag emoji |
| Old control codes | CTRL | Removed |
| Blank “invisible name” characters | HF, BLANK | Removed |
Tabs, normal line breaks and every visible character stay exactly as they are.
Why hidden characters cause trouble
They look like nothing, but programs see them. A zero-width space inside a password makes it wrong. A non-breaking space stops find-and-replace from matching “two words”. A byte order mark at the start of a file breaks scripts and spreadsheets. They usually come along when you copy from web pages, Word, PDFs, chat apps and email.
Some hidden characters are used on purpose to cause harm: text direction overrides can make a file named “invoice[override]gpj.exe” display as “invoiceexe.jpg”, and tag characters can hide instructions inside text given to AI tools. The tool removes both.
Emoji and other languages stay intact
Many emoji are built from several characters glued together by invisible joiners: families, skin tones, flags like England’s. Persian, Arabic and Indian scripts use joiners inside words, and Arabic and Hebrew text can need direction marks. With Keep emoji and scripts intact on, the tool leaves those where they belong and removes them everywhere else.
Text from AI chat tools
In 2025, some ChatGPT models left narrow no-break spaces (U+202F) in their answers. OpenAI said they were not a watermark, and removing them doesn’t change what AI detectors say about a text. It does fix spacing, search and find-and-replace, so it’s still worth cleaning.
Questions
How do I find invisible characters in text?
Paste the text above and choose "Show where they are". Every hidden character is replaced with its short name, like ⟨ZWSP⟩ for a zero-width space, and the line above the result counts them by type.
What is a zero-width space?
A character (U+200B) that takes up no room, so you can’t see it. Websites use it to let long words wrap. When you copy text, it comes along and can break passwords, links, code and find-and-replace.
How do I remove non-breaking spaces in Word or Excel?
In Word, open Replace (Ctrl+H), type ^s in "Find what" and a normal space in "Replace with". In Excel, use =SUBSTITUTE(A1,CHAR(160)," ").
Does ChatGPT add hidden characters to its text?
In 2025, some ChatGPT models left narrow no-break spaces (U+202F) in their answers. OpenAI said they were not a watermark. Removing them doesn’t change AI detector scores, but it does fix spacing and find-and-replace.
Will removing invisible characters break emoji?
Not with "Keep emoji and scripts intact" on. Emoji like families and flags are built from several characters joined by invisible joiners, and the tool leaves those alone.
Related tools
- Remove Spaces Remove extra spaces, all spaces, spaces at line ends or empty lines.
- Blank Space Copy and Paste Copy invisible characters for blank names, messages and bios.
- Remove Line Breaks Fix text copied from PDFs and emails that breaks mid-sentence.
- Remove Duplicate Lines Delete repeated lines from a list, or find the duplicates.
- Word & Character Counter Count words and characters, and check limits for X, Instagram and more.
- Alphabetizer Sort a list A to Z, Z to A or by length.
Updated October 26, 2026 · Works in current Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari · Runs entirely in your browser