TextDecoder
Baseline
Widely available
This feature is well established and works across many devices and browser versions. It’s been available across browsers since January 2020.
Note: This feature is available in Web Workers.
The TextDecoder interface represents a decoder for a specific text encoding, such as UTF-8, ISO-8859-2, or GBK. A decoder takes an array of bytes as input and returns a JavaScript string.
Constructor
TextDecoder()-
Creates and returns a new
TextDecoder.
Instance properties
The TextDecoder interface doesn't inherit any properties.
TextDecoder.encodingRead only-
A string containing the name of the character encoding system that this
TextDecoderwill use. TextDecoder.fatalRead only-
A boolean indicating whether the error mode is fatal.
TextDecoder.ignoreBOMRead only-
A boolean indicating whether the byte order mark is ignored.
Instance methods
The TextDecoder interface doesn't inherit any methods.
TextDecoder.decode()-
Decodes the given bytes into a JavaScript string and returns it.
Examples
Decoding UTF-8 text
This example shows how to decode the UTF-8 encoding of the character "𠮷".
html
<button id="decode">Decode</button>
<button id="reset">Reset</button>
<div id="output"></div>
js
const utf8decoder = new TextDecoder(); // default 'utf-8'
const encodedText = new Uint8Array([240, 160, 174, 183]);
const output = document.querySelector("#output");
const decodeButton = document.querySelector("#decode");
decodeButton.addEventListener("click", () => {
output.textContent = utf8decoder.decode(encodedText);
});
const resetButton = document.querySelector("#reset");
resetButton.addEventListener("click", () => {
window.location.reload();
});
Decoding non-UTF8 text
In this example, we decode the Russian text "Привет, мир!", which means "Hello, world." In our TextDecoder() constructor, we specify the Windows-1251 character encoding.
html
<button id="decode">Decode</button>
<button id="reset">Reset</button>
<div id="decoded"></div>
js
const win1251decoder = new TextDecoder("windows-1251");
const encodedText = new Uint8Array([
207, 240, 232, 226, 229, 242, 44, 32, 236, 232, 240, 33,
]);
const decoded = document.querySelector("#decoded");
const decodeButton = document.querySelector("#decode");
decodeButton.addEventListener("click", () => {
decoded.textContent = win1251decoder.decode(encodedText);
});
const resetButton = document.querySelector("#reset");
resetButton.addEventListener("click", () => {
window.location.reload();
});
Specifications
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TextDecoder() constructor
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decode
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encoding
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fatal
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ignoreBOM
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Available in workers
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Legend
Tip: you can click/tap on a cell for more information.
- Full support
- Full support
- Partial support
- Partial support
- See implementation notes.
- Has more compatibility info.
See also
- The
TextEncoderinterface describing the inverse operation.