HTML to Text Converter

Strip HTML tags and extract plain text. Removes scripts, styles, and all markup instantly.

Free to use. Runs in your browser.

Paste HTML and get plain text output with tags stripped. Preserves readable line breaks for paragraphs, lists, and headings.

HTML Input

Plain Text

Why Convert HTML to Plain Text?

HTML is great for browsers but terrible for everything else. Email clients, databases, search indexes, accessibility tools, and analytics pipelines all need clean text without markup. Stripping HTML by hand is tedious and error-prone, miss one tag and your data is corrupted.

This converter uses the browser's built-in DOM parser to extract text content, which means it handles every edge case that regex-based strippers miss: nested tags, self-closing elements, HTML entities, and malformed markup. It also removes script and style blocks that would otherwise leak code into your text output.

Paste any HTML, a full page, a fragment, an email template, and get clean, readable plain text. Everything runs in your browser. Nothing is sent to any server.

What Gets Stripped vs Preserved

Element	What Happens	Example
HTML tags	Completely removed	<p>Hello</p> becomes "Hello"
Script blocks	Removed including content	<script>alert(1)</script> becomes nothing
Style blocks	Removed including content	<style>.red{color:red}</style> becomes nothing
HTML entities	Decoded to characters	& becomes "&", < becomes <
Text content	Preserved	All visible text stays intact
Extra whitespace	Collapsed to single spaces	Multiple spaces/newlines become one space

What this means for you: The output is clean, single-line text with no HTML artifacts. If you need paragraph breaks preserved, you'll want to add newlines manually or use a more sophisticated converter that handles block elements.

Common Use Cases

Email content extraction

HTML emails contain tables, inline styles, and tracking pixels. Stripping to plain text gives you the actual message content for logging, search indexing, or creating text-only email alternatives.

Database content cleanup

CMS platforms often store content as HTML. When migrating data or building search indexes, you need plain text. Stripping HTML ensures you're indexing actual words, not markup.

Accessibility testing

Viewing the plain text version of a page shows you what screen readers and text-only browsers see. If the text version doesn't make sense, your HTML structure needs work.

Content analysis

Word count tools, readability analysers, and SEO checkers need plain text input. Converting HTML first ensures accurate measurements without tag names inflating the word count.

Why Not Use Regex to Strip HTML?

The classic regex approach, something like /<[^>]*>/g, fails in dozens of edge cases. It doesn't handle HTML entities, leaves script content behind, breaks on attributes containing >, and can't decode character references. HTML is not a regular language, and regular expressions can't reliably parse it.

This tool uses the browser's DOMParser API, which is the same HTML parser that renders web pages. It handles malformed HTML, decodes entities, and correctly identifies text nodes. It's more reliable than any regex pattern because it actually understands HTML structure.

Before and After Examples

Email template

HTML Input

<table><tr><td><h1 style="color:#333">Welcome!</h1><p>Thanks for <strong>signing up</strong>.</p></td></tr></table>

Plain Text Output

Welcome! Thanks for signing up.

Blog post with scripts

HTML Input

<script>trackPageView();</script><p>10 Tips for &amp; Better SEO</p><style>.ad{display:block}</style>

Plain Text Output

10 Tips for & Better SEO

Notice how script blocks, style blocks, and HTML entities are all handled correctly. The output is clean text with no artifacts.

Related Tools

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How to use this tool

Paste your HTML code into the input area

The plain text appears instantly in the output panel

Copy the cleaned text with the copy button

Common uses

Extracting text content from HTML emails
Cleaning CMS content for database migration
Preparing text for readability analysis
Stripping markup for search index preparation

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Frequently Asked Questions

What does this tool do?

It strips all HTML tags, scripts, styles, and markup from your input and returns only the visible text content. Everything that would appear on screen stays; everything the browser uses for rendering is removed.

Does it handle HTML entities?

Yes. Entities like &, <, >, and   are decoded to their actual characters (&, <, >, space). The tool uses the browser's built-in DOM parser, which handles all standard HTML entities automatically.

Is my HTML sent to a server?

No. The conversion uses the browser's DOMParser API locally. Nothing is uploaded, stored, or transmitted. Your HTML never leaves your device.

Will it remove JavaScript and CSS?

Yes. Script and style elements are completely removed, including their content. Inline event handlers (onclick, onload) are stripped with their parent tags. Only text content remains.

Does it preserve line breaks and paragraphs?

The output collapses all whitespace to single spaces, producing continuous text. HTML block elements like <p>, <div>, and <br> don't create line breaks in the output. This gives you the cleanest possible plain text.

Can I use this to extract text from emails?

Yes. HTML emails contain tables, inline styles, tracking pixels, and preheader text. This tool strips all of that and gives you the actual message content, useful for logging, analysis, or creating plain text email alternatives.

Why not use regex to strip HTML?

Regex fails on nested tags, HTML entities, attributes containing >, and script/style content. This tool uses the browser's actual HTML parser, which handles every edge case correctly. Never parse HTML with regex.

Does it handle malformed HTML?

Yes. The DOMParser is the same engine that renders web pages, and browsers are designed to handle broken HTML gracefully. Missing closing tags, overlapping elements, and malformed attributes are all handled.

Can I strip tags from a full webpage?

Yes. Paste the entire HTML source (Ctrl+U to view source in most browsers). The tool will extract all visible text content from the full document, including text inside deeply nested elements.

What about image alt text?

Alt text is an attribute of the img tag, not text content. This tool extracts textContent from the DOM, which doesn't include attribute values. If you need alt text preserved, you'd need a more specialised extraction tool.

How accurate is the word count?

The character count shown below the output is precise. For word counting, copy the output into our Word Counter tool which handles edge cases like multiple spaces, hyphens, and contractions.

Can I use this for SEO analysis?

Yes. Extracting plain text from a page lets you see what search engines see (roughly). It's useful for checking keyword density, content length, and whether important text is actually in the HTML or generated by JavaScript.

Results are for general informational purposes only and should be checked before use. They are not professional advice. See our Disclaimer and Terms of Service.