Encode or decode Base64 text — free, no sign-up, nothing leaves your browser.
Base64 is an encoding, not encryption — it's fully reversible by anyone, with no key or password involved, so it provides no confidentiality at all. Its actual purpose is compatibility: some systems (older email protocols, certain APIs, URL query strings, JSON fields) can only reliably handle printable ASCII text, not arbitrary binary data or special characters. Base64 converts any data into a safe subset of letters, digits, and a couple of symbols so it can pass through those systems intact. The tradeoff is size: every 3 bytes of original data becomes 4 characters of encoded output, so Base64 text is always about a third larger than the original.
Yes — text is converted to UTF-8 bytes before encoding, so emoji, accented characters, and non-Latin scripts all round-trip correctly. Many simple Base64 tools break on these because they skip this step.
Representing binary or text data using only printable ASCII characters — commonly used for embedding data in URLs, emails, JSON, or config files where raw binary or special characters aren't allowed.
No — this is a common misconception. Encoding is reversible by anyone with no secret required; encryption requires a key to reverse. If you see data that's "just Base64," treat it as visible, not protected, even though it isn't immediately human-readable.
Usually because the input isn't valid Base64 — it might have been truncated, have extra whitespace or line breaks inserted, or use URL-safe Base64 (which replaces two characters and often omits padding) instead of standard Base64.
No. Everything is encoded and decoded locally in your browser — nothing you enter is sent to a server.